By a Dagger Bound
by Eyes like Dawn
Summary: Princess Belle was ferried away to safety while her father and betrothed fight the ogres. Always yearning for adventure and a way to save her people, she's none to happy to be sent away until she stumbles across a dagger. For Rumpelstiltskin, he is none to happy to find he is now the slave of a lovely, blue eyed maiden. While he plots to be free will a beauty tame a beast?
1. A Dagger Found

_A/N: Hi all! What, I'm back again? Well only kind of. Those nefarious plot bunnies dragged me back, but who cares, Rum/Belle is too awesome. I don't know how often the updates will be since I have other stuff going on, but when inspiration hits ya (or bunny lasers), ya got to write! :3_

**~8~8~**

A soft, bucolic tune hummed pleasantly from Belle's lips as she wandered aimlessly through a field of tawny tall grass. Thins stalks of brown came knee high and swayed in the pleasanlt winds of spring as though pawing at the beauty for attention. A dress of light blue fell to her naked ankles, shifting in the sprightly, warm breeze that joyously whispered the arrival of summer upon the spring winds. Rich brown hair was touseled through the playful wind as she allowed the air to kiss her face and the sun to warm her.

Her bare feet felt the warm moist soil under her toes, softer than the most luxuriant of carpets, as she rambled whimsically through the un-fallowed lands. A year ago the wide field would have been brimming with growing goods from the vassals and fiefs of the kingdom, but that had been before the ogres came to her land, before their peace and prosperity was tested by bloodthirsty monsters wielding spiked maces and donned in battle plate to conquer their home.

Despite her humming a melancholic sigh fell from the beauty's lips as the little tune tapered away with the gently swirling zephyr. The smile fell from her lips into a thoughtful frown. So much had occurred since the beginning of the war and the year that had raged betwixt the armies she was surprised she could even feel happiness anymore. People she had called friends all her life were either dead, fighting, or had shown their true nature by packing up and leaving the kingdom to fend for itself.

Banishing the despondent thoughts of lost home and lost people away, her soft gaze fell to the small cottage nestled on the edge of the large field. The small building was a quaint little domicile, erected of gray stone, and given to them by the widow of a man who died in the first battle with the barbaric ogres.

Instilled with grief and terror the woman had abandoned the home and promised never to come back. A shiver slithered up Belle's spine as she recalled the pitiful scene the woman had made when the dead were brought forth in heaps to be identified.

In her crying and ranting and pulling her long hair she spoke that whispers from the realms of the queen Regina were protected better than the little, back woods realm and its shabby hamlets. It was rumored than even the foulest of cities looked a bustling metropolis compared to even the grandest of one of King Maurice's cities. She had shaken her fist at the corpulent, tired monarch and swore to give her allegiance to some one worthy of leading.

Perhaps it was true, Belle had conceded as the woman was led out, but she had given up home and family and rather conveniently a neat little home far, far away from prying eyes aimed greedily for the wealthy towns and cities.

Neatly tended flowers of blues and dusky purples were edged about the foundation and dangled heavily with the life of spring. Curious, plump bees and butterflies took their fill of nectar and droned about pleasantly, almost lazily, in the afternoon around the home. Besides for the cottage a small red hen house and a lean-to attached barn with a single plump cow pecked and mooed away happily.

Her father, when revealing his plan to send her away, begged her forgiveness for such a paltry, pathetic hovel, but Belle never minded the incredible step down from the lavish courts and gilt rooms. She adored the tiny, clean cottage unlike what nobles and dainty ladies who swooned into a faint at the very thought of such mean living had assumed. Secretively sheadored the stone hovel far better than any castle.

Her papa had sent her there for protection as the battle neared closer to their capital. After their main city of Avonlea had perished to the might of the towering brutes he had at once wanted to move her away from the gore and bloodshed.

Ignoring her protest her father and bride to be had ordered her and one elderly servant to the small cottage lest the ogres win the war, and in turn slay her or worse.

It was a noble gesture to be sure, Belle knew, but the beauty was no timid, fragile flower. She knew how to hold her own with a stiletto blade or even a dirk. Her wits could stand on par with any man and once or twice without her fathers knowing she had fiddled somewhat with troop tactics that helped win decisive battles.

How she desired to be useful, but a woman's place, as many men in her realm thought, was not in the field of battle nor going over worn maps and tactics, but to be far away and wringing her hands in worry. To be helpless galled her to no end; to know she was expected only to raise an heir and look 'pretty' in times of peace made her fume in the depths of her heart!

Oh but despite her outrage she had agreed for the health of her father. The last thing he needed while trying to hire mercenaries to fight and making simple battle tactics was a stubborn daughter. He had pleaded she leave for the sake of her dead mother who would greive to have her child slain at the bloom of life, and that was enough to queel her protest.

"Lady Belle!" Sarah, Belle's plump servant woman and guardian, hailed her from the homely cottage.

Thoughts banished by the kind voice, Belle perched her head to the sound and smiled. Sarah Potts was the picturesque look of a happy, beloved servant. Her light blue mop cap sat snugly over a mass of silver and golden honey curls. She had grown a trifle plump over the years, but she was as hardy as a draft horse and could work from sunup to sundown without a word of complaint. Her eyes were ecthed with aged crows feet, but laugh lines overcame the tiredness that came with being a maid. There was a ruddy quality to her dimpled cheeks that forever made her seem hard working and cheery.

She had served the royal family all her days, and had mostly loved her work. To Belle she had nearly become her mother since her own had passed to the land of shadow when she was but a tottering child.

A dark blue dress hung over her rounded form as she adjusted a small wicker basket in the crook of her arm. She smiled largely as her charge padded towards her like a leaf blow upon the wind as only Belle could. She was proud of her hand in rearing the princess and always liked to tote the fact as perhaps her one vanity.

"Now." She began happily as Belle leaned against the white washed fence that seperated lawn and field. She smoothed her dress free of wrinkles with plump fingers as she spoke in her normal no nonsence fashion. "I've hitched Philippe and we'll be off to town. I'll be back in a week with more supplies." Her smile crumbled to a thing line as her eyes narrowed in good natured suspicion. Far too long had she knew the mischievous, curious Belle and all the thoughts that rambled through her mind always up in the clouds. "I'll expect you not to wander into the forest unless you see sight of ogres. The field is as far as you go."

Belle sighed long suffering. "I promise my dear Sarah." She swore and patted the aging lady's weathered cheek tenderly.

The older woman seemed to chirp slightly in happiness, which reminded Belle of a pleasantly pleased bird, and dipped a small curtsey to the crown princess. "I'll hold you to that promise and I'll expect you not to get into any trouble Lady Belle." She waggled a cautionary finger at her charge. "You're not a young, gangly kneed lass any more gallivanting off on little adventures and stealing tea tarts and going into nooks and crannies to fritter the day away reading. You're a fine woman now, and I hope not to have any mischief from you."

"For that last portion, dear Sarah, I'm afraid I can't swear." The bright eyed beauty laughed merrily as she nimbly scaled the small fence; much to Sarah's irritation. Putting her arm about the plump matron's shoulders she led her to the cart and pawing Clydesdale horse who tossed his mane in eagerness to be off. "Come on. I'll follow you to the end of the path."

Once the pair was no more than a blot in a cloud of gray dust the beauty sighed once more. Her brilliant smile faded like a ray of light marred into the dust. Hands on her sinuous hips she stared forlornly at the tracks of dirt as though they were lines of her heart. Even Sarah had more freedom and adventure than she.

Who would the loving old servant come across in her journey, Belle pondered as her relentless imagination ignited. Bandits, runaway fiefs, vassals, pilgrims or deserters; all the adventures awaiting and she was stuck in remote part of the world! Why did everyone think she was too delicate a nature to take on any adventure. Her father had even worried about the trip to the clandestine sanctuary!

Belle's shoulders slumped dourly as she turned back to head to the cottage like a good daughter of a king would. Knowing Sarah she'd have already set out lunch of a few mushrooms and bread and cheese and leave a detailed note of what goods they hade left as though Belle had not arranged them all herself.

Most of the time she did more work than Sarah, by milking the one cow they had, fetching eggs form the chickens, toiling in the small garden and a host of other things to help the aging Sarah along. Besides, she reveled in the labor. To the beauty, the toil felt good; to know she could actually be useful instead of having servants fetch this and that.

Still, a frown came unbidden to her features. Sarah repelled her help when she could. She did not think it proper for a noble born lady to be doing 'commoner work'. But at least, Belle surmised almost grouchily, commoner work was better than doing nothing at all!

If Sarah Potts had it her way all Belle would do was sit languishing in the shade of the cottage in her finest gown awaiting Sir Gaston to ride up and deliver the news the ogres had been driven away and their marriage could finally be planned.

Such was the life of an exiled princess, she spat inwardly. No one wanted her to do anything and nothing ever, ever happened!

Furious, the young woman kicked at the earth sullenly. Pain erupted in her bare foot as she struck something hard. A yowl of pain blurted from her mouth as she fell to the earth clutching her aching appendage. Part of her prayed the noise had not been taken by the wind to Sarah's ears. In moments she would have galloped back around and re-planned her trip in a few days to see to her ward.

Her foot throbbed abominably as though a hammer struck inside. Taking a peek at her injured foot, she wagered there would be a bruise in the morning, and Sarah would give her cain if she somehow saw the mar. There was nothing broken she could tell, but that did nothing to help her mood.

Had she stubbed her extremity on a rock, she pondered inwardly. Curious as to what had struck, she pawed at the soil grumpily half expecting to feel a rounded stone. Instead, her hand met something hard and firm, but nothing that felt like rock.

Ignoring the throbbing pain in her foot she rested upon her knees, heedless of sullying her dress, and dug at the earth with her hands. "What in the name of-." She paused as she saw the filthy top of an old wooden box.

The box, as dark black as the soil, looked like som ancient artifact. Dirt caked the crevices and mud and muck lined the chest ingrained into every dip and hallow.

Too many it'd look like an old box forgotten on the road way in travel or buried by a young child who thought to keep his treasures safe. The chest looked completely ordinary and yet something nagged the beauty as she scraped away the excess dirt. Wood rotted and by the looks of it a plow would have uprooted or destroyed the box ages ago.

A low murmur of thunder made the beauty jerk her head up. In the distance a mass of gray clouds harried the horizon. The first storm of the coming summer. Without thinking, the beauty snatched up the filthly box in her delicate grasp. Clutching the vessel to her chest she hurried to the cheery cottage, half limping. At least, she surmised with a bit of happines she'd have a little something to keep her occupied if only for an evening.

Rain was just beginning to patter insipidly at the windows as Belle sat down in front of the box. After a quick lunch and a limping scramble to make sure the chickens were safe and cow would not bolt from the attached barn, she put on a clean dress and put a bit of ointment on her bruised foot to soothe the ache.

Now safe inside with all the chores at an end, the beauty was happy to watch the storm rage in all its magnificence whilst she turned her attention to the box on the table. The small wooden box truly did look as though some one had given it to a child. Not even a lock was attached to the lid.

"It could be a ruse." She mumbled to herself, a bad habit she had when alone to long with her ever rambling thoughts and imagination. She tapped a finger to her chin thoughtfully. "It could be a pirate's hoard of jewels or the spell book of a long dead sorcerer."

She was only dreaming, she knew. Something so magnificent could never be real and never be found by 'that strange girl, Belle'. Still, she had to dream.

With a deep breath the beauty steadied herself. The lashing tongues of silver lighting and growl of thunder added to her excitement as her pried open the box slowly. A musty scent, thick and sickening, arose from the box, holding testament to its age. For a moment she though she saw the glint of gold in the candle light, but her shoulders drooped the next moment.

Junk. Child's junk.

A few pretty pebbles, crumpled leaves, a broken toy, one hawk feather, and a rotting straw doll with a stiched smile lay in the old box. All the things a little child would love laid before her.

Despite herself, Belle sighed in disappointment. Placing a hand under her chin she couldn't help but feel cheated. "Always the fool, Belle." She chided herself. How stupid of her to actually think something wonderful and magical lay in the chest!

Perhaps what her father and Gaston said was truth; perhaps all her fervor for books had turned her into a woman with a head of useless information and incredible dreams.

Nudging the box in frustration she had no idea how perilously close to the table precipice the box sat. Before she could move to grab the container the box crashed to the floor in a littered heap of forgotten children trinkets.

Belle sighed, a habit she inwardly told herself to abandon and rose to put all the junk back inside. In the sputtering candles flame her vision caught something silver that lay under the upturned box.

Kneeling, she ignored the childish baubles rolling about on the floor and even the deluge of rain slamming upon the sturdy stone cottage. A piece of thin wood had broken from the tumble and lay in a small heap next to the box.

"False bottom?" She asked herself aloud.

Righting the box, she found only a tiny portion of steel sticking out from a fine satin wrap of blue. The tip of a blade poked out gleaming in the bickering candle light merrily. There wasn't an inch of tarnish upon the exposed sliver setting Belle's curiously into an inferno. What sort of blade under damp earth and in a wooden box did not fall prey to the teeth of tarnish and rust?

As she hefted the blade in her hand, she noticed it was lighter than any steel she'd ever felt, even the dagger she had strapped under her dress was heavier.

Wondrously, almost solemnly she removed the cloth, letting it tumble forgotten to the floor. In her hands rested a kris. The wavy blade was without blemish and the hilt wrapped in supple black leather. The only oddity to the magnificent blade was a named inscribed, nay branded, to the silver steel as a brand was put on sheep and cattle.

Peering intently in the ever darkening light, the beauty read the strange word in a confused whisper. "Rum…Rump…Rumpelst….Rumpelstiltskin?"

In an instant the wildly guttering candle light flames died. Not even a wisp of gray smoke curled to the air. The pattering rain halted, but the clouds did not whisk away. Heat evaporated into a chilling coolness that made her breath appear before the startled beauty. It was a though the very elements had ran away in fear leaving all else to fend for itself.

A malicious presence roiled into the homely cottage like dark fog. In her minds eyes, or perhaps her terror ridden mind, purple mists curled under her feet like the vapors of a dangerous morass before vanishing like smoke. The shutters once open, but secured, clattered wildly though the wind had died down to nothingness. And then it all stopped.

In moments though the noise had quieted, the rain began again, and the house seemed normal she knew another…thing stood in the room with her. She couldn't see the thing, but she could feel the tangible presence and hear the steady, soft breath behind her.

The hairs upon her arms and the back of her next danced upon end. Blood pounded through her ears and her heart jerked wildly. Clasping the leather dagger handle for all she was worth, the brave beauty gulped and stood in one motion. With the blade tight next to her drumming heart slamming against her bosom, she turned about ready to stab, even if she could, at the thing that had entered her home.

Taking a deep breath she bolstered herself and turned about. No one was there. In the drab grayness of failing light from the world nothing met her gaze. Perhaps the storm and her imagination had gotten the best of her. For a moment the beauty breathed a sigh of relief, briefly flickering her gaze down to the mess left on the floor.

A cry of terror nearly wrench past her lips as she viewed a wiry, leather garbed…thing upon its hands and knees in the shadows before her. It's face was turned to the floor leaving a curtain of long, fifthly, matted brown hair covering its features. She wished to scream, but the noise could not be strangled from her numb throat.

For long, tortuous moments for the beauty neither spoke. Both simply breathed; Belle in terror and the creature in exhaustion or fury, or mayhap both.

After what felt like forever to the beauty it spoke in low subservient tones laced with a trill. "You called, my mistress." The thing hissed, but there was no denying the intense anger under the words. In what little light that could be seen from the creature its hands, or claws gripped at the floor until marks scored the cold stone.

"I…I called you…?" Belle replied in a stammer, more surprised the straggly haired thing could speak than what it claimed she'd done.

It was obvious the being was trying to rise, but there it remained upon its hand and knees, its head down amidst a veil of straggly brown hair as though riveted to the floor and the shadows. He might have snarled, but Belle could not be sure with his presence mostly adumbrate. "It is my name on the dagger, mistress. You summoned and your slave must come."

The beauty's mind whirled crazily. Names, summoning? "I don't understand." She peered more intently into the blackness where the being was shrouded. "Who are you? Will you please come into the light?"

The thing leapt to its feet in the blink of an eye. It wasn't particularly tall, yet still dread pooled in Belle gut. With one long step it strode vilely into the dying light of the window. His skin glittered like gold and gray ash in the last, sullen rays of day and his eyes were a voided black without orb or iris.

Belle stifled a scream of abject terror and stepped back till her body hit the cold wall like a trapped rat in front of a ravenous tiger. She clutched the dagger for dear life, reveling in the little safety the weapon gave. Her hair rebelliously wafted over her face, but she had forgotten any discomfort in front of the thing before her.

He glared at her furiously, his mouth pursed as tough he did not wish to speak. His jaw was locked tightly and yet his mouth opened anyway as though not under his own volition. "My name is Rumpelstiltskin, the Dark One." His face twisted in disgust as though he had just eaten something poisonous he was trying to spit out. "And I am now your slave."


	2. Servitude

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals! You rock! :3_

**Side note: Fanfiction was on the fritz today so I have reposted the chapter.**

**~8~8~**

How had it happened, Rumpelstiltskin furiously desired to scream to himself. Even as the last word of his admitted slavery spat from his mouth he wished to rant and rave over the horrid fate that had arbitrarily befallen him so unexpectedly.

One moment he had been working in his dreary apothecary delicately formulating elixirs and potions and plying at the intricate web of his schemes and the next he felt the sinuous, dark tendrils of magic grip at his very soul and tug him away despite his efforts to regain free will.

The struggle with the magic rivaled that of the greatest battles ever waged. He summoned wards and recited incantations to free himself from the clutches of fate. Of course he had fought with every league traveled upon the magical winds, but to deny the power of the blade that wrested him away and gave him his might would be impossible. To win against the talisman that allotted his power would be akin to ripping his beating heart out of his chest.

How had, after centuries kept safe, his blade had been uncovered by this chit of a woman, he pondered infuriatingly in his vast thoughts. His eyes narrowed into hatefult slit towards the hand that clutched his blade.

Three life times ago he had planted the magical dagger, his only known true weakness, in a place no one, not even the highest of sorcerers or learned of witches would think to search. Grand magi and wizards, bent with sagely wisdom and age who even knew faintly of the blade, always assumed the Dark One would keep the artifact, his one poison, in some room woven from top to bottom with magical and physical traps.

Indeed, the fiend had stared the rumors himself and even boasted ten of the supposed rooms all with false blades in his castle and a few more scattered about the realms in nigh impossible places to reach. All of the chambers were bestowed with false daggers at the end of the strenuous perils of traps to retrieve. Should any ever reach a false dagger he would simply annihilate them from the face of the earth and get along with his day.

In truth he had buried the blade the last place anyone would look; a small coppice of woodland before the pathetic realm he now stood had ever even existed! There his weapon, his bane, had sat untouched and safe from mortal, greedy eyes that wished to subdue him and cause him ill for half a millennia. Now some slip of a woman held the chain around his collar!

Fear danced relentlessly in the woman's twinkling blue orbs as she stared wide eyed at the sinewy form of the Dark One. By the look of her in some simple spun blue chemise she was probably no more than a mindless peasant without a wit or clue what power she held gripped in her grasp, Rumpelstiltskin surmised.

Fear was good, he told himself inwardly, but perhaps the situation called for a more delicate touch and tact before the disaster could go further.

A thin smile slithered upon his glistening face as he bowed deeply to the young woman. "Forgive me for frightening you, mistress, I did not mean to alarm you." He pranced a step closer as the beauty tenaciously stood her ground; not like she could maneuver any where. Tenting his scaled fingers delicately, he stared at the kris with unabashed covetousness. "You see you have something that belongs to me and I need it back." His wiry, black talons extended out almost warily. "Come on now, be a good lass and I'll give you a cache of gold for finding my dagger. Surely you would enjoy a chest of gold rather than some old, dingy blade."

The lie smoothed past his lips easily, making him sound nearly sincere. He feigned boredom and slight annoyance as through his presence was an inconvenience and she had disturbed him for a fortunately found bauble.

"I…I don't need gold." Belle replied, trying to repel the fright in her voice. "My father is Maurice, merchant king of this land; I have no need for money."

Rumpelstiltskin's brow arched inquisitively as he cursed himself inwardly. A smirk twitched upon the left side of his thin lips. The magic inside whispered confirmation of her words instinctively now that she brandished his blade. Without a doubt he knew her words were true.

How in all the realms had a sniveling noble managed to harness his bane! Was fate mocking him in its own morbid way? Shaking the thought away he forced another grin. "No matter then, I'm certain we can come to some accord." He flourished his talons frivolously through the magic laden air.

Her brow furrowed slightly, nearly in disbelief as she peered intently into the growing darkness. "Are you really the fabled Dark One?"

Legends always whispered of a powerful man who could work the darkest magic's of their realm. Tales were spun of the so called magician in the darkness by crackling winter hearths to frighten little ones or make even adults uneasy. They told of a monster, transformed by time into a thing with horns and fur and dagger like fangs with the embers of Tartarus for eyes.

Nothing in all the tales and legends she heard and read made her think of the thing before her. He wasn't monstrous, as the stories told. True his skin was odd, but he wasn't some mangled half demon spawn.

"Yes, mistress." He snapped tritely on the edge of anger. The guise of ease faltered from his visage of golden scales. "I am the Dark One, the monster of nightmare, the most terrible fiend in all the realms, and here I stand before you!"

The beauty flinched at his tone, but refused to be cowed by his bark. "And what you said a moment ago, you are mine, truly?"

Jaw clenched tightly, he merely nodded in reply. The girl, he was fast discovering much to his chagrin, was smarter than she seemed. Behind her azure eyes lay an intelligence, but a tenderness as well that did not vanish with devious thought of revenge upon old sins done to her or glow greedily with the knowledge she could now obtain anything her heart desired.

"Will…will you light the candles, please, sir Rumpelstiltskin?" She queried dubiously as though testing a newly learned skill.

A wiry claw flitted through the warm air instantly, though the look on his face was vast displeasure. The wicks of the candles leapt to life and even the hearth glowed warmly without a spec of wood in the brick grate.

Shadows cavorted eerily about the stone work as though beings all themselves. His scales glittered in the bickering tongues of fire transforming his skin into a burnished vermilion and gold that added to his ominous oddity.

Belle jumped in surprise as the feel of magic drifted repulsively across her skin like spider webs that floated upon the wind and faintly brushed her flesh. Goosebumps bristled on her porcelain skin making her involuntarily shiver. A sickly sweet aroma faintly drifted upon the air and reminded the beauty of dead flowers in the hands of a corpse.

Her uncomfortable demeanor amused the fiend. "Is my mistress pleased?" He asked mockingly and bowed deeply, revealing in her fear.

"Um…yes…thank you." Belle nodded, but dared not come remotely close to the magical lights. "You used magic." She stated almost in awe.

Rumpelstiltskin scoffed. "Of course I did, foolish woman. My title of Dark One is not merely for show."

Belle rankled slightly at the insult and his mocking. Had she not held the dagger in her hand she was certain all she would have felt was icy terror in his insult, yet the blade she hefted added to her own bravery. "I'm not foolish, sir."

"You're not?" He taunted innocently and placed a hand to his chest as though shocked. "Dearie, you hold in your hand something that given time will spell your doom if you are not rid of it and you say you're not foolish?"

"I'm not the one who buried such an important, dangerous blade in a plot of earth am I?" She parried expertly; more than intelligent enough to bandy insults and words with the so called Dark One.

For a moment it looked as though he wished to roar in fury upon the woman. His jaw twitched like he was about to speak a curse upon her. Incredibly his anger simmered as he swallowed the words and bowed curtly. "No, mistress."

He had not wanted to admit those words, Belle noticed perceptively. His oddly hued face was crinkled fitfully as though struggling to fight. Her mild anger dampened, the beauty tilted her head slightly to the left in curiosity. "This blade makes you do things, doesn't it, like speak the truth even when you don't want to?"

"Yes." He grit through clenched teeth. He stared down subserviently. "I am bound to be truthful to my master and heed their words."

Belle stared at the dagger incredulously before shifting her gaze back to odd thing before her. "Is it truly possible for you to do anything?"

"My you certainly ask a lot of questions." He observed distastefully in a grimace and tugged at his dragon hide jerkin. "But yes, mostly anything."

"Can you conjure a pot of raspberry tea for me please?" She experimented.

Incredulity flickered across his face before he masked his look with grimace. With a snap of his fingers the ceramic blue and white kettle upon the mantle came to life. Vile magic flitted through the air making the beauty shiver once again as she watched in awe.

Steam rose from the curved spout as though water had been put on a boil. The cups, snug in the cupboards, sprang out as though an invisible hand had grabbed them and toted them upon the air.

The beauty stared in amazement as the cups fell into place and the tea pot lifted from its perch to rest in the center of the table. Milky vapors curled into the air bringing the fresh scent of a newly boiled pot of tea into the fragrance of sickly sweet magic's.

Two cups sat on daintily painted saucers awaiting to be used. Opaque steam wisped from their contents as though someone had prepared the tea by hand and poured the mixture from the kettle.

Belle stared in wonderment, half thinking herself in a dream mingled with a nightmare. The candles could have been a parlor trick by any minor magician. Even court magicians and war mages could summon small gouts of flame, but to actually make things move and conjure tea was something else entirely.

"Is the mistress pleased?" He asked once more, his voice not at all eager or happy.

Belle nodded numbly in reply. "Y…yes…thank you."

As she carefully eased into a seat she stared at the tea set as though it might come alive and chase her about the room. When she was certain the dishes wouldn't go sauntering about she warily picked up the cup between two loosely pinched fingers in case she had to bolt to safety. The tea was warm and fragrant and reminded her of home. Tea was one secretive thing she yearned from her home she regretted they did not have in the comfortable cottage.

As her father told it, when reminiscing wistfully of her mother, she adored tea and the craving had been passed down to her daughter. A nice cup of tea helped her think and bolstered her behind the familiar warmth.

Taking a percarious sip, she found the tea not as she expected. There was a distinct blandness to it as though it had been made of some thick tasteless fluid. Yet the mere thought that it indeed was tea put her at ease. Part of her worried the brew to be poison, but then again had he been able to take what he wanted by force or ill means he probably would have done so.

Smacking her lips, her nerves calmed slightly, she motioned to the fiend standing subserviently with his head bowed and claws clasped in front of home. "Would you care to join me so we could talk?" She asked, feeling more like herself than she first had when he had entered.

"Normally no." He frowned, but took the seat opposite from the beauty before continuing. "But circumstances demand I bear this droll discussion."

Doctoring his tea with two sugar cubes, the fiend gulped down the scalding brew in one hurried go and reached for the kettle to pour more. "Now, about my dagger." He continued as though they were having a quaint talk as he poured his tea. "I still need the blade. I suppose we could strike some sort of bargain, hmm? I can make you immortal, make you the most powerful mortal woman in the land, or even the most dangerous female in the kingdoms."

Belle shook her head. "I don't think that would be best, especially being so new to this…whatever it is." She replied mildly.

"Perhaps then we could simply call it a draw then." He remarked slyly and poured his third cup. His sharpend fingers clinked against the fine ceramic as he sipped slower; buying himself time to contemplate the girl's thoughts. "I'll have the blade and you can go on not wanting anything."

"I didn't say I don't want anything." The beauty nursed her tea thoughtfully. In fact she could think of a few good deeds his magic could garner.

The Dark One set his cup down a trifle harder than need be. Tea sloshed from his cup to the wood. The contents upon the table jangled as though shivering with the aftershocks of his wrath. He forced a thin, sickening smile though the hatred behind his all encompassing eyes was obvious.

"I need more information before I do anything." She added hastily, quailing slightly in his radiating anger. Despite herself a small smile came unbidden to her lips as she imagined her father and Gaston and even Sarah groaning at her for such a dull question. Her way had always been to gather knowledge then make a decision rather than plowing into the fray.

"What does having this blade mean?" She inquired lowly, her face etched with purposeful curiosity.

He huffed a mirthless hint of a laugh and crossed his arms angrily. "Are you always so full of questions, mistress? It's quite simple really. What it means is that you are my owner. I am bound to do as you command, when you command it, so long as you possess the kris. Whatever is magically possible or attainable I am forced to heed. We are bound now, you and I; master and slave."

He was enslaved to her. Belle's pink lips frowned darkly with the knowledge of his captive and she being his captor for whatever strange reason. She abhorred the thought of one man being owned by another even the gray-gold skinned man before her.

Hefting the blade in front of her face she gazed her torn reflection on the steel surface. Uncertainty lined her delicate face. "I don't like the thought of being master to another; it's not right." Admitted Belle quietly. Her eyes flickered back to the Dark One. "Tell me the truth, Rumpelstiltskin. What would happen if I gave you this blade and sent you on your way?"

Despite the lie laced upon his silver, forked tongue the fiend felt the truth surge forth like a powerful tidal wave. Anger wrenched his voice and a deep feral loathing of his true nature came bounding past his mouth. Without the dainty words he first harnessed or the oily grin, he became a beast; dark and dangerous.

"I would kill you." He growled savagely, his mottled yellow and black teeth flashing from his sneer twisted lips. In his out coming rage he knocked the empty tea cup aside letting it fall to the floor. His body heaved as though his lungs were forge bellows trapped in his slender frame. "I would rip you to shreds and then the rest of this pathetic little kingdom in order to make certain the knowledge of the blade was never more than a whisper! Even if we had struck a bargain I would have found some way, some loophole, to make certain your body was miles below the earth. The moment the blade was in my grasp I would rip out your throat and burn your carcass to ashes!"

As his voice lowered into a surly rumble, Belle gulped loudly. Her body trembled violently in terror of his foul, barbaric words. Her knuckles curled about the daggers were white as new fallen snow. It was only then she realized how much peril she was in.

His eyes flashed with something that wasn't human. He radiated a wildness that would exceed the savagery of even the most rabid of wolves. Given even a slight opening he would claw through and decimate her for his precious blade and have no qualms of it in the end. Before her was a feral and wild thing barely held in check by its one weakness.

"You're a monster." She whispered aghast, her voice trembling. What had she stumbled across, she pondered with the faint bit of her sense not enthralled in fear.

"Wrong, Dearie." He stated darkly, his maniacal trill hovering through the air. "Even monsters have morals."

She stared blankly at the one somber flickering flame on the table. Her mind whirled as though caught in the dipping flame and melting tallow. For the first time she truly possessed something extraordinary, both wondrous and dangerous, and she felt lost and bewildered. He threatened her, and yet he was powerless to harm her or her kin without the dagger.

"What am I to do?" She asked in a whisper, more to herself than the thing across the table. She could not possibly give him the dagger, for he had spoken the truth of his heart and it would only end in annihilation of her home and all she held dear.

"Probably use me to obtain your every whim and desire, mistress." He concluded in a sarcastic trill, his mouth twisted sardonically. The beastliness in his eyes fell back to only a smoldering glare and not a raging inferno, but it was there nonetheless akin to a prowling wolf biding its time to strike.

If she heard his words, she never responded. After long, quiet moments of inner thought she looked up at him. Shaking her head as though coming out of some enchantment, the beauty rose unsteadily. "Maybe if I sleep on it things will seem clearer in the morning. I need time to think."

Gathering the tea dishes she placed the in the basin and quickly cleaned them with the cool water. The small action, though insignificant, gave her a bit of piece and a channel back to reality.

Drying her hands on a gray rag, she began to move to the next room where her simple bed lay made and ready. Perhaps it all was some sort of odd dream and she would awake to a world without a dagger and the Dark One only a fable.

Troubled, Belle paused suddenly and stared at the strange thing that now called her mistress. The leather clad fiend had not moved an inch from the chair. His needle-like talons drummed lightly upon the wood as he looked thoughtful like nursing some inward reprieve.

"Do you have any place to go?" She asked warily, daring a step near with the dagger still in her hands. For a moment she nearly laughed aloud, but wasn't sure if she started it would ever stop. Everything sounded so ridiculous when laid plainly before her. She was now master of the most powerful man in the realms, he admitted his plan to slay her, and now she was asking him about accommodations.

A thin, sad smile wove upon his odd face. "Doesn't matter if I did. You haven't dismissed me yet, mistress. I can only go when given permission. I can only do anything now when I am told."

Pity stung the beauty's heart for the creature. She could not fathom being a slave, but the amount of coddling and having to bend to rules and her life constantly being managed by others made a twinge of compassion strike inside. For a man so powerful it must have galled the very marrow in his bones to know he was no longer his own master.

Nodding once she spoke clearly. "Then Rumpelstiltskin I dis-." A hint of caution abruptly reared in the back of her mind. Even in the dim light, she saw his drumming hand tense and cease its rythmic tattoo. Her brow crinkled ponderously. "What would you do if I did dismiss you?"

The perception of the woman! Rumpelstiltskin cursed inwardly at her keen eye and whispering instincts now hieghtened by the dagger, but showed no hint of anger. "Clever girl." He snorted irksomely though a hint of admiration skirted the loathing in his hate laced tone. "I would have done everything in my power to steal back my blade once I was dismissed from your orders. When you dismiss me I may go where I choose and do what I will until you summon me once more."

Had she dismissed him he would have worked furiously to hire another to gain back his blade or work some sort of underhanded, un-obtrusive magic to take the power from her. While he could not gather the blade directly, there were other means he knew very, very well.

"You tried to trick me." She accused austerely. A faint hint of anger sparked in the ice of her voice. She had tired to be kind and he would have found some way to steal the blade and end her life!

He nodded, though Belle noticed he winced faintly and shifted uncomfortably in the chair. "Very observant, Dearie. You're smarter than you look."

Oh she was a clever one, he remarked in his mind. There was no lack of wits or bravery to the girl!

"Well I won't dismiss you, but I won't have you sitting in a chair all night." Belle stated, here eyes gazing upon him with more distrust. "My guardian, Sarah, is away. You may have her room down the hall for the night. I'll pull the bed down for you."

For the first time since his arrival something other than anger or veiled smiles laced the Dark One's face. Surprise etched his grim features as she padded away with a candle in one hand and his dagger in the next.

From the history of the previous Dark One's he should have been weaving powerful magic's to erect castles and stock piles of gems and lavish delicacies and ending those who'd ever done a wrong to his master. Instead he was being prepared a bed in a comfy stone cottage.

Minutes dragged by before the Dark One rose stiffly from the chair, his leather garb creaking, utterly stupefied by her actions. He felt no compunction to follow, but she left a choice for him to stay in the chair or sleep in a bed. Such a strange girl his new mistress, he noted for the second time that evening.

Cautiously, without need of flame or light, he stealthy wove his way through the home. His mind whirled with the thought of the girl instead of how to be free. Why was a noble away in a cottage, why was she so intelligent to bypass his tricks and ruses?

"I'm all done; you can enter if you wish." Belle announced though her back was turned to the fiend. The blade, now strapped to her person as her old dagger had been, warmed against her flesh the closer he was near letting her know of his presence.

The room was a lovely little berth, mostly bereft of ascetics, with a few pieces of carved furniture. Though he still fumed inside of his lack of free will, the Dark One had to admit the bed looked inviting with its plump white pillow and checkered blankets. He couldn't recall the last time he'd slept in a real bed. And after all the fight he'd put up with the powers that bound him, he was fringing upon the border of abject exhaustion.

Nodding somewhat awkwardly the beauty stepped away to the door. "I'll leave you to get some sleep and I don't want you trying anything crazy to get your dagger. It's mine for now and well you'll just have to bear it. "

He regained prone, staring at the cozy bed, her midnight eyes visible with confusion of what recourse to take. She was not being cruel and demanding at least, he reckoned. At the very least he should not try to strain her generosity on the first day lest he uncover a not so pleasant side of his owner.

"By the way." She paused and turned back to the still fiend. "We weren't properly introduced, Rumpelstiltskin. My name's Belle." With that last offered information she gently shut the door.

With only a single candle for light the fiend stood still as stone in the cozy quarter. His dragon like hearing perked to her every move as she made sure the dagger was close at hand and slipped into bed with her fingers wrapped loosely over the hilt. He could even hear her even breaths as she drifted off to fitful sleep; her mind no doubt still humming with the facts and information.

Once he was certain she was truly abed did he even begin to move amongst the comfortable room. His dexterous talons nimbly unlaced his leather jerkin with a few plucks of threads. Letting the tunic fall to the floor, he stared into the dresser mirror in the quaint chamber.

Branded upon his chest, over his ancient heart was the name of the woman who he was tasked to serve. The markings were a deep black and etched into his gray-gold flesh as though carved into his skin.

"Mistress Belle." He murmured in the dim light, tasting the name upon his tongue as though it were an exotic wine. His wiry claws smoothed atop the moniker now emblazoned on his skin just as his name was inscribed upon the dagger. Names had powers, and now, though she did not seem to realize it to its full potential, she had the most powerful name in her thrall.


	3. Orders and Plots

Cool morning dawned radiantly over the winding fringe of the dark forest land and the stone cottage nestled by the edge of the golden field. Pearls of glistening dew laded the emerald blades of grass and the webs of industrious spiders into diamonds dangling upon strands of gleaming silver silk.

The sky was an eternal sapphire with out a blemish of white to blot the firmament. Brisk winds breezed pleasantly about the land sending the aroma's of damp earth and awakening flowers into the air honeyed air.

Belle always loved the mornings after a ferocious storm battered the realms. There was something so pure and fresh about the earth as though the growling thunder and the lashes of lightening and the deluge of rain temporarily scoured the world clean of the ills that plagued them.

A smile played upon the beauty's face the warmth of the suns rays seeped into her form. Her eyes closed, she faced the beaming sun allowing the golden glow to cascade her, filling her with certain tranquility. After the tossing and turning night she had, her imagination rampant with nightmares and terror and doubt, the fine day felt good and set her mind at peace.

The first thing she'd done when she awoke with the crimson streaks of dawn was creep down the hall. Her feet barely scudded upon the cool stone as she peeked into Sarah's room. Half of her wished the night before had only been a dream, but when she had awoke the icy chill of the kris still met her hand telling the events had not simply been imagined by a wanting mind.

She found the strange man, Rumpelstiltskin he called himself, not asleep on the bed, but on the floor. The finely tailored blankets had been heaped under him as he slept without a sound, his scaled, oddly hued face crinkled as though troubled. Only the steady rising and heaving of his torso measured he was even alive.

With the final confirmation that nothing had been a dream, she had rushed about to do her chores promptly.

Now out in the open she felt herself steady and sink back into normal, thoughtful Belle not given into confusion and panic. Still true, she did not know what the vast changes and owning the dagger fully meant, but at least she felt somewhat confident now with a new day and a fresh start to the problems she could tackle them justly.

Chickens clucked hastily for their breakfast severing Belle's reprieve in the glorious morn and her wandering thoughts. A chuckle fell freely from her mouth as she dug into an old gray satchel and sprinkled feed upon the dusty earth. "Here's breakfast, silly things." She chided good naturedly and generously doled out their dried corn.

"Commoner work, my, what a strange thing a princess would do." Rumpelstiltskin trilled in his impish pitch from the threshold of the stone cottage.

A small shriek of surprised erupted from the beauty's mouth. Feed flew through the air with her sudden start, causing the chickens to rouse in frenzy and beat their wings as though trying to fly and pluck the kernels from the air.

Embarrassed she had been so startled, and forced to endure the brief flurry of squawking hens and a blizzard of feathers, Belle turned to the fiend hoping the blood that surged to her cheeks did not betray her wariness.

The Dark One leaned causally against the door, his arms crossed over the same leather jerkin as before as he peered at his new mistress intently. Not many nobles would set themselves to do common work, much less enjoy the labor as he'd silently watched her all morning. She had even laughed and smiled to herself while doing the more grueling work of shoveling muck.

"I'm a princess in hiding." Parried Belle as she swiftly wiped her hands on the apron tied about her work dress. She shrugged as she fiddled to unloose the cords to the off-white apron. "Further more my reasons should be my own."

He smiled thinly and bent his head in the faintest of acknowledgements. "Of course mistress; far be it from me to pry into your strange dalliances." The slight grin ghosted away into a tight frown. His face crinkled as though he fought an inward battle he knew he would loose.

Unexpectedly he gave a bow. "Is there anything you'd wish from your slave, mistress?" How he utterly loathed to ask, but the blade compelled him so even with the slightest mental compulsions.

Neatly folding the apron she marched back to the dim safety of the cottage determined to seem fearless and in control to her captive. "Not at present, no, but if you'd like you can join me for breakfast; I made enough for two."

For a moment the fiend remained silent, his voided eyes silently perused his captor as though she were some novelty.

Belle gave a heavy sigh, laden with irksomeness. "Why must you look like you're calculating every word I speak?"

"You surprised me." He admitted bluntly and averted his eyes from his mistress like a scolded child who had been caught staring. From all the past knowledge of the previous Dark One's he had collected, learning from their mistakes, and delving into their histories none had been invited to breakfast of all things. For all of the previous slaves of the blade, the first hours of their captivity had been rife with strenuous workings of magic and weaving of the dark power for gain. He expected no less from her, but still she managed to off kilter him.

Belle arched a brow curiously, but decided not to inquire of his answer. Hanging the feed satchel up on a jutting peg she entered the cozy home. With a stoic will she forced herself not to put a hand to the dagger even though she had her back turned to him. She would not be a thrall to fear for however long he was to remain.

The scent of freshly made biscuits left to cool and honeyed oatmeal wafted in the cool air mildly settling her nerves at ease. Behind her, the beauty could sense the Dark One trailing her steps obediently.

"Rumpelstiltskin." She tested his name almost uncertainly as they walked through the dainty hovel. Her mouth quirked slightly, but not unkindly. "Even you must admit your name is a mouthful. Would you mind if I called you something else?"

From behind she could sense him shrug. "You may call me whatever you wish, mistress, you are my owner."

"May I call your Rum or Rumpel for short?" She queried as they entered the heavenly smelling kitchen.

Rumpel. He nearly visibly cringed at the moniker. Only the queen called him Rumpel, which grated to know end. If she could witness him now, the most powerful sorcerer in all the realms bowing and scraping like a common servant, she would have cackled in devious delight to see him brought so low.

"Rum if you like, mistress." He nodded tersely.

A pleased smile bloomed upon her face as she busied herself in the kitchen. "Rum it is then."

In a few moments she had two earthen bowls filled with piping hot oatmeal with cut apples placed atop and a bowl of biscuits and a jar of jam centered upon the table.

Throughout it all, she had been aware of his eyes riveted upon her from behind. In a way Rum reminded her of a prowling beast who had tracked down a foreign creature. Though he was uncertain of its habits and ways, it was still determined to make a meal out of the strange thing sooner or later.

A weak smile blossomed upon her lips as she placed the meal before him and eased down into her own seat. "Dig in." She attempted another smile, but memories of the night before and the truth of his snarling words rose back in her mind, making her smile turn to nothingness and her skin to pale.

Rumpelstiltskin stared inquisitively hard at the steaming bowl of oatmeal. Forgoing the wooden spoon by his side, he dipped a curiously claw into the creamy cereal. Daring a taste test, his eyes seemed to alight like some child discovering a fantastic food.

In moments the Dark One had turned a neat breakfast into a sopping mess. Hefting the bowl in two hands he slurped greedily at the meal, forgoing any utensil. Creamy oatmeal dribbled down the sides of his mouth as he licked and devoured the meal in the most abhorrent fashion Belle had ever seen.

Even starving beggars had more manners than the thing before her!

Her own meal forgotten, the beauty's eyes widened in amazement to see him gulp down the meal like an uncouth, wild animal. His claws snatched soft biscuits he dunked into the pot of blackberry jam or scooped with his bare hands. At times when he did not uplift the whole bowl to his face, he dug his fingers into the mess and licked the excess from his digits.

He looked up from his ravaging of breakfast as though completely oblivious. Using his sleeve he wiped the trails of oatmeal from his thin lips. "You're not hungry, mistress?" He asked dubiously as though he had fallen for some trick.

"Oh no, I am." Belle assured quickly and picked up her spoon. Rebuking herself roundly for staring she dove daintily into her meal whilst the Dark One continued to scarf down the food as though he'd never tasted anything so grand in all his days.

"You know I'd forgotten how good real food taste." He licked sticky jam from his fingertips. "Conjured food always feels thick, taste bland, and is rather unsatisfying." So long eating meals summoned from magic he had mostly forgotten the taste of a hot meal. To conjure meals was far less hassle and quiter than going into a village and having to listen to people mewl in terror as he brought a loaf of bread!

Belle lowered her spoon, her brow furrowed thoughtfully. "Like the tea last night?"

The fiend nodded absently in reply, too busy with the rest of the biscuits to bother with words. Spewed crumbs flung from his mouth in perhaps a half attempt at an answer before he abandoned the notion in favor of more breakfast.

After a few moments of silence from the pair the beauty abandoned her breakfast altogether, her little appetite vanished in the wake of his gorging. Stirring uninterestingly at her meal she spoke. "I gave it much thought last night and this morning and I have a few ground rules you must follow."

Immediately the Dark One ceased cramming his mouth with food. Wiping his face with the back of his hand, the fined nodded obediently. Magic pulsed hotly through his body involuntarily, at the ready to adhere to her orders.

"You are forbidden to kill any of my people." She declared firmly. At least with such an order she could make certain whatever schemes and mischief he spun in his mind wouldn't end in death for her kingdom. She loathed the thought of innocence dying by his plans to be free.

Distaste formed upon his lips. "It will be so, mistress." He flourished his hands lazily in the air once more some aloof, trilling creature. "Is that all you demand, mistress; that I make sure to play nice with foolish mortals?"

"No." Her voice was low, almost in a whisper. The beauty chewed her bottom lip thoughtfully as though having some inward turmoil before deigning to speak. "My kingdom has been ravaged by war for the last year, which is why I was sent here in the first place. A large ogre tribe is trying to enslave us and bring our realm to ruin. If you can I want you to win the war for us and make sure they will never come here again, please."

With the talk of ogres the Dark One felt rage, fierce and wild, surge through him, filling his body with an unholy darkness. Dark blood boiled through his veins even at the disgusting word synonymous in their realm for death and torment.

A feral sneer twisted his lips as he rose. "It would be my pleasure, mistress." He replied truthfully in a growl and bowed deeply. Dealing with ogres would be good for him, the fiend noted to himself. Killing unmercifully always gave him time to think and scheme and perhaps now let off the rage that had built inside since his captivity. One his anger was quenched with the black blood of ogres; he could probably see past the haze of fury and plot duly.

Hazy, lavender smoke instantly curled from the very stone at his feet. Purple magic tightly coiled about his body wrapping him in a veritable cocoon of dark magic.

In a heartbeat the beauty was alone. She grimaced at the feel of his sinister magic's still wafting through the air and rubbed her arms to find Goosebumps pricked upon her skin. With such a man at her disposal saving her people had to be the number one priory. Still, though her people were perishing every day to the monsters, she wondered if trusting him with such a matter had been the right thing to do so soon.

~8~8~

The blazing sun was sinking contentedly behind the coppice of dark firs of the gloomy forest before Belle felt the dagger faintly warm against her flesh. Crimson hues turned the orb of day blood red, sending long shadows upon the tawny field that danced in the wind.

Her eyes scanned the shifting blades anxiously; mind lost in troubled thought. If Rumpelstiltskin truly ended the war she would be home soon; back to her father and the courts and the hosts. No longer would she be even modestly free to toil and enjoy the simple life, but be delved back into a world of silk and rouge and painted faces with false smiles.

To her surprise she found herself not pining for the royal life with the same fervency she knew any royal would have. Other women of noble esteem would have been weeping for joy to be dotted upon once more by daintily painted ladies in waiting or tittering courtiers alike. Yet she liked the tiny cottage and the simple way of life, but her duties demanded she be back in place.

The kingdom needed an heir and a king in place of her aging papa and Gaston was awaiting the end of the war so the wedding could be planned. Even now a few letters crammed into a chest, usually dotted with blood and poor handwriting, that reached her were all were detailed of his undying ardor that grew with each epistle and the longing he felt to finally be wed.

She sighed dourly and frowned sullenly at the thought of Gaston. If only she-…. Abruptly her nerves thrilled on end. Magic wafted through the air heralding the presence of the nefarious Dark One.

A putrid smell stung her nostrils sending alarm crying through her form. In mere moments she unsheathed the blade secretly hidden in her chemise and clutched the kris to her pounding chest for security.

A gasp wrenched past her lips as her eyes gazed upon the bowing fiend who now called her mistress. Dark blood dripped from the straggly strands of his hair. His leather attire was flecked with bits of bone and flesh and washed with gore. A ragged, dragon hide cloak covered his back and he had a satchel slung across his torso.

"The deed is done, mistress." Rumpelstiltskin confirmed in a subservient tone. "The ogres have been vanquished, never to return to your kingdom."

No underlying loathing fringed his voice as he related the crushing defeat of the ogres. Whilst he had plunged into battle, slaying ogres with his bare hands and streak of purple magic that crackled from his fingertips, he had plenty of time to think of his captivity, his mistress, and how to get out of the situation. With each death cry that squealed into the smoke laden air and the new fount of blood spurting over him, he had sorted the situation and perhaps the solution.

Despite her obvious intelligence she did not seem to know what she held in her grasp; which could be his only hope. So long as she did not realize the full potential he could be used, he could outsmart her given time. To feign complete obedience of an accepted fate was the recourse he plotted; though to say he was pleased of the plan would have been a lie.

Her tenderness could be a weakness delicately maneuvered to open a chink in her now near invulnerable armor in the future. Please, show ultimate obedience and servitude, and one day she would grow careless thinking him a harmless slave with no fangs to bite. If he remained completely accepting to her words given time she would slip and the loophole would be open for him to tie the noose around her neck and let her swing!

"To show I obeyed I brought you a gift, mistress." He revealed in attempts to gain favor with his captor. Never had he met a noble who did not enjoy gifts of conquest or power. Flicking open the satchel to his side he produced his gift to his mistress.

The Dark One flinched slightly as her scream of abject terror pierced the air.

Blood oozed from between his fingers as he proffered the severed head of the ogre war lord to his owner. The grotesque face was lined with old and new scars which trailed about its prickly, leathery features in tribal patterns. Dusky purple and mottled black bruises made by thin fingers sported around its neck detailing to even the most simple of folks the head had been ripped off by bare hands. The misty, rolled back eyes and the thick, twisted lips were stamped with a look of utter horror forever frozen with the last moment of its gruesome demise.

Petrified, the beauty staggered back from the severed head. Her gut roiled uneasily as though her lunch was about to revisit her. "Why would you bring me such a disgusting thing!" She demanded, her features pallid.

"So you could see I obeyed, mistress." He muttered humbly. A look of confusion and a hint of agitation crossed his scaled face. Why wasn't she pleased to see the gift? "You wanted the ogres defeated so I decimated as many as I could and brought you the leaders head as a trophy."

A greenish hue faintly tinted her features as he eyes widened with horror. "I never said decimate anyone! I wanted them driven back to their marshes and warded from ever harming us again! What did you do?"

"I slew as many as I could then went to their villages and did the same." He shrugged his cloaked shouldered callously. "The ogre clan is nearly obliterated with no warriors or growing warriors left. The rare few that did manage to survive will never return and their tale of nearly compete destruction will dissuade any other from ever attacking your kingdom. Are you not pleased?"

Belle swayed in place, feeling as though a spear had skewered her. The ill feeling had vanished to be place with a horrible realization that formed an icy pit at the bottom of her stomach. "You…you committed genocide and nearly succeeded. I only wanted the ravaging ogres defeated and sent back, and you slay innocents as well as guilty." And she was to blame, she knew imparitively.

Inwardly the beauty cursed herself for not being more specific with Rumpelstiltskin; for actually allowing herself to think the creature in front of her would not ravage but have clemency on those who were simply following orders and trying to survive. He was dangerous, more than dangerous, and she had set him loose for a time instead of keeping him on a short leash.

Innocence, even for ogres, had died because of her blunder of assumption. "No." She instinctively clutched the dagger in a vice to keep the tears of her foolish request from earlier at bay. "No I am not pleased."

The Dark One lurched forward as soon as the words left her mouth. The shaven head dropped from his hands and lolled about the floor at her feet staining the gray stone with rivulets of black blood.

A strangled gasp burst from his lips as he fell to his hands and knees. Pain racked his wiry form as he felt the magic of the blade turn on him instead of offer power.

Liquid fire burned through his veins, setting his blood to boil. His nerves trembled and turned to sharp stabs of pain which thrummed through his form. The kris made certain he never stepped out of line, and feeling the pain made him wish he never had.

Belle stared in shock as the being writhed in pain. His entire body trembled as he groaned deliriously in torment and shook violently. "Were you injured?" She asked concerned and rushed to his side despite the dark blood and the gore.

"The price for displeasing, mistress, is not a pleasant thing." He hissed through gritted teeth. "You're angry and the blade makes me pay."

"No, no, no." Belle stammered hastily as though the words would make his pain stop. In her mind she pleaded with the dagger to sever the pain. "You've saved my kingdom and the lives of my people by the thousands; the last thing I want to do is punish you. I'm extremely grateful on what you did, just not _how _you did it." To punish him after his service, no matter how gruesome, felt wrong.

Instantly the pain faded away. A sigh of relief tumbled from Rumpelstiltskin's lips as the torment receded. "Thank you, mistress." He gasped, regaining the breath that had slowly been driven from his lungs.

Ignoring the ugly gray-gold flesh swathed with the black blood of ogres and his onyx eyes she knocked the bloodied tendrils of straggly hair from his face searchingly. Others would have avoided his strange flesh, but the more she saw it the more she did not mind. Her free hand lifted his chin. "Were you hurt in the fight?" She inquired again, almost worriedly.

The Dark One's body tensed as her fingertips shifted the gore sopped veil of hair. Her fingers just scarcely whispered over his skin as though trying to help, but indecisive on to fully touch him.

How long had it been since another being had dared come so close, much less touch? The sensation of another warm being sent shivers through his body he could not explain. He nearly moaned at the touch of another so long denied him even in the most basic of senses. A thing most people did without thinking was something he hadn't felt in two centuries; a faint touch, and a gentle one at that.

He averted his gaze, hoping to mask the foreign look in his orbs as he dampened the unexpected feeling. "A few minor wounds I already repaired, mistress." He announced and cleared his throat.

A faint smile hinted at her lips as her eyes sparkled in the last crimson streams of light. "Good. And thank you for saving my people."

"I hear and I obey." The Dark One remarked as he forced himself to draw away from her touch. Though it galled him, he forced himself to stick to the plan of absolute obedience without protests and not causing anymore suspicion from his clever owner.

Unexpectedly he asked. "May I rest, mistress?" He asked humbly and suppressed a yawn. "Large workings of magic can be exerting when done all at once."

Belle rose to her feet swiftly, his fingertips stained with blood and quivering. "Of course, Rum. If you can stay awake for a while longer I'll bring supper to your room."

Fighting a smile, the fiend stumbled through the cozy cottage, unheeding of the blood that trailed him. His plan could work; she was far too tender hearted. A little humility here and there, attempts to please her and show a willingness to obey after a time and she would let her heart get in the way and open to his advantage to devour.

Gentleness was a weakness one could ill afford when holding the chains to the Dark One. Ruthlessness was the key that made others stay master of the previous Dark One's so long. Former masters had been heartless and cruel and sadistic. Her large heart marked her death warrant just as greed had marked the baron who owned the last Dark One. They all had a weakness that could be exploited with the right manipulation.

Pleased with the solidity of his plot, the truly fatigued fiend dragged the neatly made blankets from the bed and slumped to the floor. A chuckle escaped his lips as he felt his eyelids sink.

His new owner was as good as dead and didn't even know her doom was upon her.


	4. What to do With Him

_A/N: Thanks so much for reading and reviewing lovelies! Hugs for all! :3_

**~8~8~**

Belle awoke for the first time in nigh a year with a light heart that felt to bursting with exuberance. Her soul sang in her bosom as though a weighted mantle of guilt had finally been cast off from her shoulders.

The haunted cries of ragged mothers told their fathers and sons would never again welcome them with laughter and smiles and open arms, seemed to drift from her heart like mist in the dawn as though the memories had been forgiven. She no longer felt the knot of guilt that tightened in her gut to see her fathers orders meted out and know the men who followed the tactics might never come back to a place where they worked and lived the hardiest yet received none of the grandeur due them.

Though she knew she couldn't do much in war effort, she wanted to help in some way rather than being taken away to safety while others were drowned in sorrow and forced to bear the horrors of war. Now the pain was at an end, the mending of a shattered kingdom could begin. In the rebuilding she swore to aid as best she could; to and be a princess worthy of her station to a loyal people.

A content smile drew upon her lips as she pulled the blue covers up to her chin and snuggled and squirmed deeper under the warmth of blankets. The sky outside her window was a pearl gray charcoal smear. Bits of pink and purple banners of light trailed the pale firmament as though rejoicing in the beginning of day.

Pump birds were just beginning to waken from their woodland lofts and greet the gray dawn with their gaily tittering songs. The cow was softly lowing and the chickens were already bickering with one another making another grin creep to her lips in amusement and the tranquility of a humble, bucolic life.

Regret for knowing she would have to leave her docile sanctuary soon gnawed at the back of her mind like an old wound, but the fact that her people were finally free from the threat of murderous ogres temporarily overrode her melancholy.

Of course she truly had nothing to do with the victory. She had only asked for her people's lives to be spared the wrath of the ogres, the doing had been Rum's. His magic's had won the day and saved her people from annihilation and chains being cast about their necks to serve the ogres.

Her delicate brow beetled slightly at the thought of the strange man who sprang unbidden to her thoughts so easily. What exactly was she to do with him now that they had triumphed in the battles? To keep him as a slave whilst he had all but alleviated her people of such a fate seemed the bitterest of ironies. But then again he had sworn to slay her if he ever had the kris back in his hands.

Immediately, the beauty decided the Dark One was going to come with her when she went back to the palace. For a brief instance she toyed with the thought of keeping his presence clandestine by ordering him to the boundaries of the cottage. Sniffling negatively she abandoned the thought and scolded the cruel contemplations at the same time.

He was no horrendous creature to keep hidden from the eyes of man. She could not be so cruel as to leave him all by his lonesome, bound to the territory of the woods and the cottage until she had sufficient need to call on him. That would have been cruel to the man…creature…thing that had saved her kingdom.

And besides, she noted to herself as she peeled the thick covers off her form, she wasn't certain at the stage they found themselves she could let him out of her sight for long periods of time.

Stretching, her joints popping pleasantly, the beauty suppressed a yawn behind her hand as she rose to do chores. For him to be out of sight for so long could be a disaster that ended in destruction for her home. She would not make the same mistake of assumption and disregard his wit to bend words as she did with the ogres.

He was obviously plotting, she conceded with herself as she quickly splashed cool water from a daintily painted ceramic basin and slipped on a sturdy gingham dress for morning chores. She would have been surprised if any man would not plot for his freedom or at least dream of being his own master again.

The only question that remained was what exactly was he trying the scheme and how could she intercept his plot. She did not mean him harm, but nor would she simply sit and allow him to maneuver some scheme to slay her and take back his dagger.

Tying a strip of sky blue ribbon, her one indulgence, to keep the mane of maple curls form her face she took a moment to stare in the mirror. A small smile traced her lips as a hand fell to the dagger hidden under her clothes like a talisman. Touching the blade for reassurance was now almost second nature. When her hand met the steel she felt its magical warmth and knew he was near, and in a strange way she found the heat comforting.

Feeling the magical steel under her chemise let her know without a hint of doubt she was safe. If she ever lost the kris….

Shrugging the troubling thought away, the beauty grabbed her ocean blue shawl to ward off the chill of morning and began to head out the door. "One problem at a time, Belle." The beauty whispered comfortingly to herself as she stepped out into the cool hall.

The small corridor was dark in the pale morning light that barely slanted through the closed wooden shutters. A chill whispered up and down the coarse stone walls making a shiver trail the beauty's spine.

"Mistress." Rumpelstiltskin spoke softly as to not frighten the young woman as she appeared.

The beauty tensed as though expecting a stab from an assassin blade but did not scream as he thought she might. Belle blinked rapidly in surprise to see him up so early before the sun had barely peeked over the tree tips.

Swallowing down the tremor that wobbled like a lump of coal in her throat she attempted a warm smile and fought the urge to clutch at the kris. "Rum you're up early."

"I took it upon my self to finish all the chores you normally do." He revealed, his head bowed subserviently. He hid a feral grin as he inwardly preened. The more he did willingly, the sooner he could get out of the nonsense and have his dagger and once more dot mischief upon the realms and fall back into the pattern of his old schemes to find his boy.

"Th…thank you, Rum." She replied uncertainly. Grateful she was, yet her voice flitted with scolding. "You didn't need to do that, I enjoy the work."

A frown nearly stamped upon his lips in frustration. Again he tried to gain favor only to not see her so pleased as he wished. Who was this noble bred chit who did not delight in seeing her enemies slaughtered and frowned upon less work to do!

He was trying his best to incur his plot, but even this morning his efforts had no effect on the strange woman. Tucking the thoughts away for later he gave a mental shrug and proceeded with the first seeds that need to be planted in order for his machinations to blossom proper into freedom.

An impish grin slithered upon his gray lips as he twiddled his fingers. All at once the hearth in the kitchen alit with a warm roaring fire. The reddish glow pulsed at the base of the hall letting a hint of light come through the cool corridor. "Ah, but you see, magic make things so much easier mistress." He explained in his sly, tittering tone.

"And it makes me all that much more dubious of your motives." Belle countered suspiciously as she stared at the fiend, her eyes narrowed. "The first day you were here you fought tooth and nail to even deny anything I said or speak the truth. Two days later and you're doing things without being asked. You have to be up to something."

His grin never faltered. "Of course there are motive behind my doings, Dearie; there always are."

Belle nearly physically staggered backwards as though his candid admittance was a blow he had dealt her. Why would he revealing something such as that? Her brow furrowed in confusion and enflamed curiosity as he continued in his dangerously impish way.

"I would be foolish to try to deliberately enrage my mistress. If you are pleased the dagger does not punish me and you are not too demanding a task mistress as of yet. I would be a fool to tempt your wrath and a fool I am not." He finished with a small, courtly bow.

Of course she would suspect something, even if he had no workings lurking about in his brain to usurp her power. His mistress was far too bright to underestimate him to a degree. It was a fair challenge to outwit her. He indeed did balance upon a fine line, but at least if she knew even a sliver of his true intentions things would be easier. Half truths were always the hardest to see through of course.

Part of him momentarily considered had he not been in so dire a situation he would have enjoyed battling with her wit. She would have been a breath of fresh air to flex his intellectual muscles compared to the hate filled mind of Regina and the smart, but not quite to his caliber, couple of Snow and James. They were all pawns, easily moved, but her, he would have reveled in the confrontation!

"So it's survival." She arched a brow inquisitively and perhaps a bit of guilt at the hand she played in his capture. "Simple survival of a captive?"

He shrugged simply. "One must do what one can in perilous situations. I can't deny the words I've already said if you loose the dagger, but I won't make things purposefully hard on myself. Seeing as how you were less than pleased with my actions yesterday, I thought to start the day off right to again favor with my mistress."

"Well, as misguided as your actions were this morning, thank you again." She dipped a small curtsey to the fiend. "But there is only one thing you can do at present that will truly make me pleased."

He nodded and awaited obediently with his hands clasped together in front of him. Inwardly he whispered to himself his utter servitude without protest would be worth the effort after he held her still throbbing heart in his hands and crushed it into sand that ran between his talons. "Anything you command my mistress."

Teasingly she poked a finger at his jerkin. Blood had stiffened the leather and the odor that radiated off his form was borderline intolerable. "You, my dear Rum, stink." She crinkled her nose unpleasantly.

He flicked dried blood from his black talons and chuckled. "Blood is not meant to smell like daisies, Dearie." The Dark One parried. He rocked back and forth on his heels to mask the displeasure upon his face. "Besides, it's not that terrible. A bit of blood and grime to strenuous for your delicate sensibilities, mistress?"

"A bit?" She arched a brow incredulously and felt a grin tug at her lips. "Your hair is matted with blood and things I don't care to know of. I want you clean."

Sighing in surrender, the fiend could not suppress a hard frown. "As the mistress wishes." Bathing was not one of his most pleasant activities. Most of the time as he prowled the world or lurked the dank halls of the Dark Castle, there was no need for baths and in fact, he hadn't really bathed when he was his old, Hobble-foot self.

Dark lilac stained magic tinted his talons as he prepared to banish the filth away from his oddly hued flesh.

"No." Belle stopped him. Immediately the magic faded away from his grip leaving only a gore encrusted claw. She stared at him levelly. "No magic. You can draw water from the well outside and put it in the wash room. You may heat the water with your magic, but I want you to have a good, hot bath to scrub all that ick off."

His mouth thinned angrily; feeling his pugnacious ire and his beastly temper rear. "Surely you jest! You can't expect me, the Dark One, to draw water like some common little vagabond!"

He was above this, he raged inwardly, the darkness inside swirling like a gale upon the coasts. He was above being owned, being told what to do like the worm cripple he had been, and being forced to do menial things!

"The sooner you bathe the sooner you can have breakfast." Belle replied, commendably keeping the amusement out of her voice with a sagely nod.

The fact remained her was covered in gore and filthy from head to toe. Should her father arrive later in the week or messengers she didn't want them frightened off by a man stinking of rot and coated in blood on top of his strange eyes and glittering skin.

For an instance, Rumpelstiltskin stared hard and hatefully at his mistress. If she were to keep making silly demands he absolutely loathed, such as have a good bath, then his plan, he surmised fitfully, would take longer than he assumed.

Obeying mortals without something in it for him or protest was not a thing he had done since he had became the monster. Rage galled him to pander to her without protest, without showing he hated his servitude, but he had to endure if he had any chance of being free.

Grumbling discontentedly, the fiend turned upon his heels and grouchily slunk out of the house.

"You'll thank me once you're clean." Belle huffed a slight laugh as she turned to towards the kitchen to prepare a meal. After a meal his temper usually thinned. Humming a soft tune her mind wove around what to make.

Then the screaming began.

A wail of terror pierced the air, making Belle's hair stand on end. A million scenarios ran through her mind as her hand instinctively went for the blade. Had something new occurred to bring demise? Had the Dark One found a captive or loophole?

Rushing outside in the wake of the Dark One, she peered about the small yard for the screaming soul. Her heart slammed against the walls of her chest as she began to brace herself for some horror to rain down upon her.

Dear, plump Sarah shrieked some sort of battle cry as she wielded an old straw broom which had once leaned up against the stone walls of the cottage. Her dimpled cheeks were an apple red with exertion as she charged about wildly like some enraged bull; her cloak fluttering like a banner.

Philippe, strong and hardy as always, neighed in sheer panic as he tried to bolt away from his tether and the old cart laden with goods hitched behind him. With every uncertain step and buck he looked as though he would rip the reigns from the post and go charging madly into the forest. His whinnies of fear only added to the chaos.

Before her, the ever loyal Mrs. Potts swung the dusty broom like a claymore towards the confused, nimbly side stepping Dark One. Dust churned into the air in billows as she moved exceedingly quick for one of her age.

An insipid frown rested upon his dirty visage as he dipped and ducked the ferocious swings. Wispy, purple spurts of magic enveloped him from time to time telepoting him in small jumps he used to avoid the combatant maid. He raised no hand against her, but his fluid movements were more than enough to keep him from ever getting hit by the poor swings that missed their marks widely.

From the corner of her eyes the pleasant maid caught Belle standing worriedly at the darkened entry of the cottage. "Run milady!" She extenuated each word with a wide swing of the broom that whistled through the air. With one rather vicious swing she herself spun all the way around, nearly making her tumble. Her mob cap fell slightly in front of her eyes as she truly began to swing blindly at the fiend. "I'll hold this monster off; you run into the woods to safety! Now away with you monster!"

"Sarah it's all right!" Belle assured the stoic guardian as she ran towards her dearest servant. The sight would have been comedic had the beauty not known just what the fiend could do had he not been ordered to harm any of her people. Plucking the worn broom handle from the maid's grip she let the instrument drop to the ground and patted her heaving shoulders comfortingly. She fought to hide a smile. "It's all right, truly, he won't harm me or anyone here. His name's Rumpelstiltskin, he's the Dark One."

Sarah stared at her young charge as though she were crazy as she caught her breath. Belle had her time when she made up fantastical tales, but the loyal servant could always tell when they were simply made up stories; this one, however, was not. "The…the Dark One…? The legendary monster of great power?" She stammered in disbelief, though every ounce of her knew Belle's words to be true.

"Yes, yes, but he won't harm anyone, I promise." She gently replied to her now heaving guardian who stared wide eyed at the scaly fiend.

"Don't make promises you can't keep, Dearie." Rumpelstiltskin interjected lowly; much to Belle's distaste. He squirmed slightly and she knew, though she did not wish it, the blade had stung him slightly for the little remark and displeasure.

The dutiful servant shook her head numbly. "What mischief have you gotten into child?" She muttered and cast a disapproving and yet worried, motherly glance at Belle.

Despite herself a laugh surged from the beauty's lips as she hugged her life long friend. "It's a long story, but I'll explain."

"Oh but there's not nearly enough time!" Potts exclaimed delightedly and clasped her tubby work worn hands together elatedly. Her green eyes sparkled like a young lass'. Though she was shocked, not much could so easily knock the always dutiful and bustling Sarah down for long.

Straitening her matching mop cap over the mass of sweat damp honey curls she smiled exuberantly. "Gaston should be here by late evening. I came back early to tell you the war is over! The ogres were utterly decimated! Word by falcon messengers tell your knight is riding as fast as he can; north as the crow flies! Oh missus it's a miracle; they say the warrior awoke to find the corpses of ogres burning in great heaps! The smoke from their carcasses nearly blotted out the sun!"

"It was him." Belle declared, though for the life of her she could not imagine why the words left her mouth or why they held a hint of pride. She proffered a hand to the grisly Dark One. "Rumpelstiltskin was the one who defeated them."

Sarah blanched instantly as though the reminder of the fiend was poison in her blood. She intrepidly peeked over Belle's shoulders back to the fiend standing with an empty bucket in his clawed hands. "That…thing?" Her lips quirked in disgust. "You mean…It saved us; why, how?"

"It's all a very long story, Sarah that I will tell with as much time as we have." She grasped her guardian's hands together. "Come on, we'll make breakfast and I'll tell you everything. But first…." She began to lug her plump servant over to the grim fiend.

"Sarah this is Rumpelstiltskin. Rumpelstiltskin this is my maid servant; I've know her all my life." She introduced happily.

The Dark One replied with a twisted sneer showing the rows of his hideous black teeth. His eyes glittered dangerously like a beast on the cusp of breaking free of its chains and ravaging any unlucky soul caught in its path.

Sarah squeaked in terror and shuffled to hide behind her mistress. "Is it supposed to growl at me?" She asked her ward warily. "It looks dangerous; will it harm us?"

"No." Belle assured gently. "He serves me for now." She replied but the words seemed not to balm the guardian's fears. Still Sarah clutched at her ample green dress as though at any moment she would need to hitch up the gown and dart to the safety of the bleak woods.

Confusion traced the beauty's face. Sarah was not one to be easily frightened in any regard. She had always seen the guardian stoic even in the worst trials, but she seemed absolutely terrified next to the Dark One.

To show her worried friend she smiled at ease towards the fiend. "Rum, please do not snarl at Sarah, she is like a mother to me and I won't have you being hostile."

His gaze flickered to her hatefully though the sneer vanished into a thin frown laced with anger. "Of course mistress." He bowed once, and departed to fill the bucket.

Rum wasn't that frightening, Belle noted to herself as she led the shaking Sarah into the quaint cottage. He had his moments, but to her there was nothing so outwardly terrifying.

"I don't like It, missus." Sarah admitted in a tremulous whisper at they entered the dark cottage. She shivered and leaned against the cold coarse wall for support as one plump hand fanned her sweating face. "The things skin is like old snake flesh, and its eyes are like the depths of Hades! It's worse than what the legends tell! It's ugly, hideously ugly, and looks like some creature torn from nightmare! It makes me want to run and scream and never look back."

Taking a glance back, Belle observed the fiend through a window as he grumpily drew water. She had never seen that of him even on the first time they had met. True she had been startled but not terrified. In her eyes, he looked nothing as Sarah described.

His skin looked like golden dragon scales and his eyes were not so bleak and cold once up close to see them clearly. His orbs were the same color as a crisp autumn night, but warm in their own way. He was odd not ugly to her, and when the light hit his strange skin just right he looked somewhat becoming.

"You were just startled." Belle patted her governess' shoulder lovingly. "After a hot meal and once he's cleaned up he won't look so bad to you."

Sarah paused suddenly, her eyes nearly haunted as she stared crazily at the girl as though she were seeing two different beings. "Child have you not seen the thing; it is a monster stuffed into some mockery of man-flesh!"

"No he's not. His body is different, not bad; just different." She defended her Rum stoically. In her estimation he certainly came no where near what Sarah thought. But perhaps it was simply the elderly Sarah's nerves and the excitement of a won war.

A sudden worried thought struck the beauty as she smiled warmly at her guardian to soothe her mind. If Sarah, as warm hearted and gentle as they came, thought Rumpelstiltskin some sort of unholy monster in her eyes, then what would the ever nearing Gaston think when he arrived to gather his betrothed...?


	5. An Ill Fated Meeting

_A/N: Yay, quick chapter are quick! Thanks for reading and reviewing!_

**~8~8~**

Candles and the large hearth danced merrily in the deep of night as mistress, servant, and slave waited in the cozy kitchen. A reddish, orange warmth radiated from the homely cottage's dim light giving the hovel a comfortable feel in the darkness that engulfed the farmstead.

Outside the firmament was a velveteen ebony bed dotted with a miles of twinkling diamonds as pinpricks in the sky. The moon was a pregnant orb in the blackness illuminating and gilding the sleeping world for miles around in its pallid luminance. Crickets and toads and other nightlife serenaded in the nocturnal reverie of the world lending to a quaint symphony of sounds and smells of a cool spring evening.

On any other night, Belle might have sat close to a cracked open window and let the blackness lull her off to sleep. But not this night, on this night she felt an icy knot of dread deep in her somersaulting belly.

"Your betrothed is certainly taking his time to ramble along and gather his lady." Rumpelstiltskin remarked in a bored trill that belayed his hatred of his owner. His wiry talons flittered nonchalantly through the air as he leaned half adumbrate in the shadows against the cool stone of the kitchen wall.

Now modestly clean he did indeed look different to the beauty who only saw him before filthy and on the border of a wild creature fresh from a bloody hunt. His clothes were a different dark burgundy type leather he had conjured for himself that fit snugly over his scaled figure. Dark brown hair, still straggly and tangled, was free of gore and dried blood and a far better improvement. His scaly flesh glittered in the warm light making his skin glisten gently in the embers glow like the golden scales of a dragon breathing down fire.

To Belle he was definitely cleaner than when he had first arrived. Privately a bit of her thought he looked dashing; his skin far more mulled gold than insipid gray. Inwardly she liked the color of his flesh no matter what ridiculous things Sarah spoke of his 'ugliness'.

Nearly in the center of the room Belle paced anxiously in a floor length golden gown that glittered in the smoldering glow of crackling flame. Despite her fervent protest, the hardy Sarah had made her don her finest gown in order to greet her husband to be. Tradition and her station demanded she look her best for her coming beau and Sarah was all but a mountain that had to be moved when it came to royal traditions and customs.

After hours of arguing and insinuating and coaxing the worn, anxious beauty finally succumbed to her tender guardians plea and donned the fine dress worthy of any of royal creed and blood.

Though the Dark One cared not a wit of what fashions and fancies took mortals in any age, he could not help but note inwardly she looked rather fair in the gown of golden gossamer. Each fiber clung perfectly to her body showing just enough to be modest, but more than enough to set a mans imagination into a veritable inferno. Her thick russet hair cascaded past her bare shoulders laying against her exposed porcelain skin perfectly.

Despite himself, his voided eyes lingered over her curiously when he knew she wasn't looking. She did not aim for flamboyant costumes as he had seen so many nobles and royals with jester like painted lips and horrendous amounts of make-up as they wobbled in garish, outlandish dresses that could scarcely fit through doors.

At least, Rumpelstiltskin noted with an inward laugh, as his eyes greedily took in her simplistic, but lovely figure, he had not fallen into the hands of some ugly, greedy noble. His mistress, though many things, was aptly named in the regards to looks. Who ever had bought her hand was to be renowned for having such a lovely woman as a wife.

"Do you think he stopped at a town to spend the night?" Belle inquired ponderously to no one in particular. Nervously, she twirled a lock of hair around her index finger.

To the fiend he thought he caught a faint wisp of hope in the words that the betrothed actually had been delayed. Hidden in the shadows a sly grin clandestinely slithered upon his lips at the thought of trouble in paradise for his mistress and her elusive mate to be. Perhaps if she was no fan of her impending husband, or he no ardent passion for her, he could use such a thing to his advantage.

Ever firm Sarah shook her graying head in protest. Her face was null of any thoughts as she sat closest to the bickering hearth flames to warm her old bones. Twin bone knitting needles worked rapidly, almost blurs, in her thick hand as she knitted some scarf of other as she normally did when she was nervous or excited.

"I should think not, missus." She harrumphed in tune to the rhythmic clack of the needles working their pattern. Not looking up from her work the dutiful maid smiled wanly, her features elongated and twisted in the dim light. "Never you worry; sir Gaston would ride to the abyss of Hades and back to see you."

"I would go fetch him that is what you desire, mistress." Rumpelstiltskin interjected hollowly as he grimaced. A bit of time to assess the situation on where she and her betrothed relationship stood would perhaps be a boon in his plot to be free.

The knitting needles noticeably clacked harder as Sarah tossed her hair fiercely. Her features hardened slightly in perhaps disgust. "Never that, missus!" Argued Sarah in a sudden burst of panic as though the very thought was anathema. Her eyes flickered hazardously to the fiend as though he would leap upon her.

In her eyes he was truly nothing more than a barely leashed wild beast. "You don't want sir Gaston to be delayed by a frightened horse that threw its rider and bolted into the words in fear of…_it_. In fact." She paused to clear her throat sagaciously as a plump hand smoothed her simple green dress. "Mayhap it would be better if you sent the thing into the cellar, away from decent folk, until Gaston was settled for the night. He's had a hard ride and the last thing he needs when he arrives is to see that…creature skulking about."

"Absolutely not, Sarah." The beauty rejected immediately. Heat in a conflagration surged intrepidly to her heart warming her more the hearths flames. Anger roiled beneath her surface like the fire of a volcano. Her hands curled into fists. She would not cast him away under the cottage as though he were some filthy secret.

Both slave and guardian blinked at the stoic zeal of her answer. What in heavens name had gotten into the girl?

Rumpelstiltskin settled back into the shadowed nook of the kitchen confusedly; his arms crossed once more. He'd been fully expecting to be sent down into the cold, dank cellar post haste to make certain his beastliness did not ruin the reunion of princess and knight. Many people preferred dealing with him in darkness and shadows where he could not be easily seen or looked upon.

He knew he was no handsome creature to be stared at. He did not care, but he knew just the same and oft reveled in others uncomfortable demeanors around him. The fear they displayed was a fine wine he supped when they came scuttling to find him. He enjoyed the nightmares and terrors he instilled. Now his mistress insisted he stay as though he were some guest.

Delicate hands straitened a few invisible wrinkles in her golden gown as she nodded firmly. "He saved our kingdom and I refuse to hide him. Gaston should thank him, not find offence."

Sarah opened her mouth to argue but the thunder of hooves and the jangle of tack and harness made her mouth shut tightly in expectation.

A horse whinnied out in the night making Belle leap in startled surprise. Gaston had arrived at last.

Forgetting her knitting the servant rose gracefully, her cheeks dimpled in motherly delight. "I'll let him in." She proclaimed and proceeded on her way.

"No." Belle stopped her with an upraised hand and an uncertain look to the Dark One. Licking her lips she smiled warmly at her guardian. "I'll go outside and explain the situation so he wont be surprised when he comes in."

A look of disapproval clouded the servants features. This was to be a time of reunion and celebration, not explain they had a wild thing lurking in the sanctuary. She opened her mouth to argue, but a stony look from Belle once more made her mouth close quickly.

Begrudgingly she sat once more in the rocking chair. With a sniff she lay her hands delicately upon her lap over the needles and waited patiently..

Loud knocking resounded from the door as Belle began to steady herself to face Gaston and explain about Rum. He was a good man, but could be thick headed at times. Anything different to Gaston usually meant he wanted to hunt or kill it or put it in some fair display to gawk at.

"My lady!" His jovial voice seemed to ride the wind and echo throughout the house.

Hitching her gown in fistfuls the beauty sprinted as fast as fast as she could allot in the simple dress through the dark stone corridors. For a moment her hand wavered upon the bronze latch as though unsure. In an instant she almost considered never answering but tossed the notion out quicker than it came. Gaston had been a lead captain in the fights with the ogres; it would have been more than ungrateful to deny him entry.

"Gaston." Belle smiled warmly as she creaked opened the door to the humble cottage. A lump caught in her throat as she forced a wider grin upon her face to properly greet her husband to be with an acceptable amount of exuberance.

Gaston was a towering specimen of a man. Eyes of murky green sparkled in the night in a ravishing glimmer. His raven black hair was cut in a military trim unlike the long hair he had normally sported in the peaceful days. His jaw was rugged with days stubble growing over his handsome, chiseled face.

Every part of him displayed nay screamed he was a warrior. His shoulders were squared and proud and body was toned with muscles that rippled beneath the coat of glistening mail. A golden sword clung to his waist and the tabard across his chest was the regal colors and crest of his knighthood he normally adorned himself with on important occasions.

Gaston cut the near perfect image of a stalwart, brave knight and many a woman had tried to lure him with their guile and tempting ways. Many would have even found it worthy to boast they had been once courted by the handsome knight. But none save Belle had ever publicly held that 'honor'.

Belle had known Gaston all her life. Her parents and his, the wealthiest family next to her own, had conjoined the marriage once both had been born. Both had grown up close, knowing they'd soon be wed and rule the kingdom hand in hand.

"My Lady Belle." Gaston grinned as he barged into the cottage like a huge, unwelcome boulder. His muscled arms wrapped about Belle's waist lifting her as he twirled her about. The beauty couldn't not suppress a genuine grin at his antics; Gaston could be charming when put his mind to it and to finally see and old friends after so long warmed her heart. His hearty laughter echoed about the hall like thunder. "It's over Belle; the war is finally at an end!"

Before she could reply in kind the brute dropped her gently to her feet. Doffing his red plumed battle helm he lay it on a table next to the door as he made straight way to the warm hearth.

"Gaston." Belle began again uncertainly, but the knight seemed not to have hearkened to her.

"Cold night for being so close to summer." He laughed and unclasped his cloak lying it anywhere in his march to the warmth of the kitchen as he continued. "I can see why you were so happy to see me, Belle. You must have suffered terribly in this drafty, old cottage. Nice little spot in the woods though, saw a few bucks on my travel here; I might build a hunting lodge on this spot in a few years. I'm just so happy we can be near again now."

The beauty followed behind trying to find the words to prepare him for Rum. All the months away she had forgotten how her beau could be especially when it came to listening. "Gaston."

Even as the moniker left her mouth he stomped into the cozy kitchen. Belle winced as she heard the dull thuds of his boots come to a dead stop. The sound of a blade being drawn from its scabbard hissed through the air.

Chills slithered down Belle's spine as she bit her bottom lips worriedly. Shadows of brandished steel that slanted across the gray stone walls told that Gaston had indeed stumbled across the Dark One.

Cursing lightly under her breath Belle hefted her trailing dress in fistfuls and ran heedlessly to intercept the interaction before her groom to be did something unscrupulous. Gaston had always been a kill first then ask type of man. There was a very real chance he would do something he would regret vastly.

As she entered the kitchen her eyes darted to the Dark One and her betrothed.

The fiend stood exactly were he had been, his slender arms crossed over his burgundy leather cuirass and his needle like talons drumming against himself. A thin smile etched his lips as he stared interestingly at the knight as though he was amused. The tip of Gaston's blade lightly pressed against his throat but if he noticed or cared it never showed.

By the fire, the dutiful Sarah spared glances at the scene calmly as she worked her needles at a snails pace. A hint of morbid satisfaction danced in her eyes as she tried to pretend to merely be knitting.

"Gaston, please take your blade from his neck." Belle sighed exasperatedly as she padded towards them both. "He won't harm anyone."

Rumpelstiltskin let out an impish giggle despite the blade inched to his flesh. "Again, Dearie, making promises you can't keep."

The brute squinted hard in the dim light at the creature as though the glow from the hearth was playing tricks on his eyes. "Belle you know this…thing?"

"Yes." The beauty replied gently. Expertly hiding a sigh of relief she was simply glad he had not tried to run the Dark One through.

Gaston's face twisted in dull confusion. Steel flashed in the embers of flame as he slid the steel slowly about the fiends jugular trying to stir a reaction. "What is it? It's so ugly and scaly looking. Is it an animal?"

A hand fell over Gaston's prompting him to lower his arms. The beauty frowned, her brow furrowed. "No he is not an animal. His name is Rumpelstiltskin. He is the Dark One but cannot hurt anyone here.

"The Dark One? The ones the older tales speak of?" He scoffed harshly in disbelief as he cautiously removed his blade minutely from the fiends neck. How could the thing before him be the Dark One? "He looks more like a stupid beast to me than some magical man of legend; I don't believe it. I think you've been fooled, Belle." A cruel light glinted in his jade eyes as he shook his head in self assurance. "No, you're just some strange freak with a stupid name aren't you, beast?"

Unperturbed the Dark One flickered a glance to his mistress. He saw no reason to be upset with a half wit he could annihilate at any moment with his mistresses command. Only a fool brazenly poked a bear and expected not to be set upon with vengeance.

Anger and displeasure smoldered in the beauty's eyes towards Gaston. "Now Gaston you have no right speaking to him that way." Belle defended tenaciously. "He saved us from the ogres, it was his magic's that slew them."

The knights jaw worked suspiciously, his eyes narrowing into twin slits. "I don't believe it. Let me see the beasts power if he truly did such a feat."

"May I, mistress?" Rumpelstiltskin inquired, his trilling tone revealing just a hint of eagerness unable to be suppressed in a subservient tone.

Belle nodded warily as her hand fell to the dagger beneath her gown for good measure. "I suppose so if he'll believe."

A delish glint alit in his ebony eyes at the approval. Snapping his fingers magic wafted like smoke through the air. The scent of sickly sweet magic's drifted about the kitchen making the knights nose twitch unpleasantly. Purple power of the Dark One coiled about the knights feet as though he were in the middle of some strange fetid swamp gas.

Before their eyes the brutes flesh appeared as though melting like candle tallow. The sickening crunch of bones crackled louder than the wood in the hearth as he began to mutate.

Surprised, Gaston only uttered a singular cry of horrendous astonishment before his voice altered into something utterly animalistic. His blade clattered uselessly to the floor in front of two hooves.

In the midst of the kitchen no longer stood a handsome knight, but a gray donkey with a rope bound about its muzzle. The only sign of anger from the mule was the two long ears that flicked rapidly in indignation and its baying of abject terror.

The Dark One could not suppress a harsh laugh of fiendish delight as he bowed lowly. Already he could feel the power of the blade punishing him with stabs of pain, but to do something so shocking had been worth the torment. "An ass for an ass, mistress."

"Rumpelstiltskin turn him back!" Belle gasped, not amused in the slightest.

In the corner Sarah had slunk into a huddled mass, making scared symbols and looking for a way to save her mistress and escape the monster.

With a small nod the fiend did as he was bid once more leaving a knight instead of a donkey.

Gaston staggered in sheer shock at the sudden transformation. Belle held him steady sp he would not go reeling and harm himself. His limbs quivered like jelly as he breathed rapidly as though he had been in a long loping run.

Had he not been so surprised and possessed the nerve he would have ran the fiend through for doing something so humiliating. And yet even he knew no magician he had ever heard of had the power to do such a feat!

Gaping he turned to the beauty slowly. "So that beast truly is the Dark One." He ran a trembling hand through his hair. In an instant the simple thoughts of his mind whirled with an open world he had never dreamed. Mountains of jewels were erected in his eyes. Troves of gold and weapons and a kingdom that stretched the realms all alit in his mind. The possibilities swam through his head filling the knight with an excitement that quivered tremulously through his rugged form. "Belle do you know what this means we now have the most powerful beast in our grasp!"

"Wrong." The fiend interrupted tritely, his voice clipped. "Only mistress Belle controls me; only she has the power."

"How Belle?" Gaston queried eagerly, his eyes wide with gluttony filled ideas befit a simply moron. "How did you enslave the beast? How do you make it follow commands?"

Belle stammered, her mind awhirl. Never had she seen Gaston so eager for information that didn't concern hunting or fighting. What would he do with such information? "I found a stone buried in the earth with inscription. I said the magic words and he appeared in place of the stone." She lied uneasily to her beau.

For as much as Rumpelstiltskin wished for the dagger back, part of the beauty knew he would loathe to have more find out his secret. Indeed from behind she saw his shoulder physically slump and a look that might have been gratefulness dart in his eyes before being replaced back by burning hatred.

"So now you control this thing?" Gaston pressed.

Belle merely nodded in reply.

The brutish knight roared a bellowing laugh. Crushing the beauty tightly against his chest he pealed with laughter wrought of devious joy. "Belle do you know what this means? Our kingdom will finally be worthwhile! Your beast will make us famed throughout the land! Who will dare try to march against us with that monster on our side!"

"I won't use him for such things." Belle interject so fiercely the knight blinked in surprise.

What had caused such an outburst, she wondered mildly before shaking the troublesome though away. A thin grin traced her lips as a small, mirthless laugh tumbled from her mouth. "I mean, not directly, not until we've got the kingdom back in order and our wedding planned. We'll depart first thing in the morning tomorrow."

"Of…of course." Gaston replied quietly. His eyes flickered to the grim fiend who stared at him with the eyes of a feral creature upon its mortal nemesis. They would never like one another, they both knew. "Of course." The knight echoed, his mind awhirl with possibilities.

~8~8~

Dawn was a miserable affair both in Belle's heart and out upon the world.

The sky was a drab blear of dirty gray that seemed to patter a somber melancholy with its chilled burden. A thin mist of gray rain fell in curtains about the realm transmuting everything into the sad, deplorable tint of charcoal gray. The air held the chill of the earth close making the damp a cold that sunk to the bone and weighed upon the soul like sopping rags.

To Belle the gray permeated her heart and soul worse than the land. Leaving the cottage was akin to leaving her home all over again.

Silently before any save Rum had awakened she had traversed the home one last time. Each nook and cranny held a memory and each striation and granule of stone a piece of her heart. In the stone cottage, she realized is where she had felt most home and now she would leave her comfortable sanctuary to be thrown into the world of painted faces and painted hearts. Her soul pined for the simple laugh, to be alone with hardy work and good books and gain from her labors, but alas, fate had not granted her such a life.

On the bright side the rain demanded thick cloaks be worn by all. With that tiny sliver of silver lining the beauty comforted herself as she prepared to leave. At least with a cloak about him, the Dark One would not initially frighten the people of the kingdom.

To save time the fiend was teleporting them to the very outskirts of the town so that they would not send people tumbling over themselves in a stamped of terror to see their princess and Gaston arrive in a thick cloud of magic.

"Everything's ready, milady." Gaston remarked to Belle in a sleepy yawn he hid behind a balled fist. Pulling her to the side of the cottage, he pecked a quick kiss on her lips as was normally proper in a couple of their caliber; anything more and both knew Sarah would appear quicker than the Dark One to shoo them away whilst she bore the largest of grins.

Belle smiled wanly as he peppered her gently with kisses. Inside her belly roiled with disgust as she fought hard not to frown. His breath was vile and his kisses demanding. She squirmed uneasily in his grip, but that only seemed to entice him and not give him a hint that she wished to turn away.

If he even noticed her melancholy he spoke not a word of the sadness that washed her features. His lips twisted grisly as he thankfully pulled away A sneer hatefully replaced his lustful smile. "Your monster has arranged everything except which way the people will run when they see him."

A deep frown marred her lovely features, unable to halt the displeasure. Since the night before he made it his business to hate Rum. "Now Gaston it's all worked out. We probably won't encounter many people on our way to the palace."

In truth she truly didn't know what both Gaston and Sarah found so terrifying about her Rum. Would everyone else see him the way they saw him, she worried in her thoughts.

"Still." Gaston shrugged. "Perhaps it was better if you kept that beast on a leash, just to let people know it can't hurt anyone or at least put him in a cage as say he can't break out."

"That's cruel and inhumane, Gaston." Belle repelled him, pushing him away. Anger flickered in her eyes she quelled back. She had always known he could be a bit surly, but never thought him so vengeful. "Now please, go see that the horses are well hitched and that Sarah hasn't forgotten anything, you know how forgetful she can be at times."

For a moment he looked as though he were to speak or argue. His jaw clenched but he nodded and marched off in the muck and wet. Boots squelched under the mud as though echoing his displeasure.

"He wants to humiliate me you know." Rumpelstiltskin remarked lightly in a laughing trill as he stepped out of the shadows of the stone cottage.

His leather clothing could barely be seen under the coarse cloak he wore. Rain had seeped through the old fabric dampening his straggly mess of hair and making rivulets of water run across his face that made his scales gleam. A smile stretched upon his gray lips. "I turned him into an ass and now he wants revenge."

"He wont get it." Belle smiled a bit more genuinely as she thought back to the instance of seeing Gaston the donkey.

Later in the night when all lay still and resting she had had to bite into her blankest as she chuckled herself silly under the covers thinking of the noble, haughty Gaston transformed into a mule. The form certainly did become him more than a man, she admitted in the depths of her heart.

Mirth faded from her lips and eyes sooner than it had come. A sad sigh wrenched past her lips as she ran her clever fingers over the wet, cold stone. Tears welled in her eyes but she fought them back tenaciously.

"You will miss it here mistress?" Rumpelstiltskin inquired so suddenly he surprised himself. Why had he bring up such an obvious sadness for her? It hadn't been for cruelties sake, not when he owed her for not putting him in a cage of slapping a collar on him as Gaston had suggested.

She nodded dourly. "I will, but we all have to make sacrifices. My people need a queen and a leader. And besides." She huffed half a laugh sending a plume of rain and vapors into the chill air. "I've had more than my share of adventure here."

"You know should you ever feel the need to return only speak your command and I will obey." He reminded her subserviently.

"If only it were that simple, Rum." Belle smiled sadly. "But things change and we cannot always do what we want. Now will you please prepare the portal; best to not linger." The words nearly choked but she forced through them the strangled misery in her tone.

He bowed deeply. "My pleasures mistress."

Splaying his wiry fingers forth, the fiend summoned the latent magic in his blood. Mist like the milky wisps that roiled on the earth sprang from his hand into the air. In mere moments a whirling vortex stood before them looking dark and perilous.

The horses neighed uneasily, but with Gaston's strength and will they went through first. Sarah the near indomitable, sprang through next along with an uneasy Gaston who plowed through, refusing to look like a coward when an old maid had gone through in one leap.

With one last look the beauty stared upon the lovely cottage she adored. The hearth was cold and the windows were dark. Not billows of smoke puffed mightily from the chimney. Flowers hedged about the foundation had shrunken into themselves from the cold and the land was damp and chill like the pit in her stomach. With a small whispered farewell, she turned away as though turning away from her only home.

Bracing herself with a firm will, Belle walked through the portal back to the home that had never really been home with her strange new thrall Rumpelstiltskin.


	6. Homes

"Here we are!" Rumpelstiltskin trilled lightly in his tittering manic way as he pranced out of the other end of the silvery- purple portal. His silver buckled boots seemed to scarcely tread the churned, muddy earth as he ushered them out of the purple opening rent through space and time.

Brown muck dampened and hindered all but the Dark One's impossibly light steps as they staggered out of the portal uneasily. The trio all but lurched into the field, breathing heavily as the magic grudgingly let them free of its sinister claws. Eyes wide they stared at one another, shaken by the jolt of magic that had ferried them miles and miles all in one step.

Traveling by magic may have been time saving, but to say the journey was comfortable was impossible. Magic skittered over their flesh like small hairy spiders delving into every part of their bodies. They had become nothing but mist floating upon the currents of wind only to form into solid flesh once more. The experiance was unnerving to say the least.

"Move along now." Rumpelstiltskin instructed impatiently as he directed them onward through the shimmering curtains of rain and away from the glowing rip through time. "The more you move the less portal vertigo you will have. And be hasty; if you dwaddle about the portal you might lose a hand when it shuts. " He announced happily as though nothing could faze the sinister grin snaked upon his face.

The horses that had been forced through the portal stamped the damp, trampled grass skittishly as they reared and pushed to be away from the magic. Opaque vapors erupted in plumed spurts from their flared nostrils and their eyes rolled crazily in panic as they stamped in earnest to be away from the iris of the portal.

In the forlorn sheets of drizzling rain the tradesmen kingdom of Maurice the merchant king rose eerily in the clouded grayness. Nestled by a long stretch of silvery, meandering river that led down to the open, perilous seas, the kingdom was once a small, quaint realm to behold.

Being so close to the snaking tributary, sea traders and craftsman had always hastily made port in their kingdom before the arduous journey to the sea.

To the young dreamer Belle, sailors and merchants who ferried goods and crafts from unknown realms, whichhad always seemed like far off, different worlds, were men and women of adventure. Their bawdy songs sung in grizzled voices and learned from different realms and their tales of far off places and wild beasts had always enraptured Belle's imagination, sparking her craving for adventure.

Once upon a time to have been able to escape Sarah's watchful eyes and managed to slip out of the palace to the docks had been a dream come true, if only for a few hours. Now the beauty wasn't certain if the docks were still standing or if any who sailed the main dared float near.

The open land that surrounded the kingdom was verdant, flat terrain normally in bloom with golden wheat and grains and vegetables that were greedily bought up by passing caravels and war ships.

In summer and fall the fiefdoms and land would be ripe with goods and happy townsmen and workers who reveled in their peace and prosperity their tiny kingdom allotted. The smells of summer would mingle with backing bread and the fragrance of wood harvests from the surrounding forest being made into homes or furniture for faraway lands.

To Belle's abject dismay the home she had once lived all her days seemed a strange, lost phantom to the life she had once known. The kingdom looked like a long decimated realm that had set in utter ruin for ages.

Fresh scars of battle were gouged deeply into the earth telling the tale of the combat that had loomed so perilously near. Large hunks wood was all that remained of the ogre's primitive siege engines aimed murderously at their coveted prize. The broken trebuchets and wrecked ballista's, liberally scored with the signs of battle, lay desolate or stuck into the ground as morbid pinnacles testifying to the ill that had been wrought upon their realm.

Wheels and upturned, burnt out carts and armor that glistened in the rain lay scattered about them like some strange gravestones bereft of worded epithets but with story's marked upon them in blood and dents.

Save for the hissing of rain pattering drearily to the earth all sat eerily silent in the abounded battle field as though the dead were sleeping and those about were loathe to awake them.

Above dark carrion birds wheeled in the gray firmament as though hoping to spot another wretched cadaver to gorge themselves upon.

The city itself looked akin to some emaciated body shriveling into a dead husk. What once was plump and prosperous was now gnarled and bent and broken. Patches of crumbly stone walls lay in great rubble heaps as though a claw had gouged out parts of the fortifications. Homes on the fringe of the city were gutted by fire and pillaged. Even the century old castle which pinnacled above the entire town held blows by boulders that smashed into the ancient walls, leaving gaping holes in the gothic architecture like hallowed eyes sockets.

Belle could not contain a gasp of pain as she gazed upon her home brought near the brink of wrack and ruin. Claws of horror wrench her heart in a vice. Perhaps, she assumed, Rumpelstiltskin butchering the ogres had not been the most terrible of things.

"The ogres came very close to storming the walls and seizing victory." Gaston revealed grimly as they marched through the muck stoically. He pulled the gray, oilskin cloak further over his head as he snorted rain away from his nose. Quiet unexpectedly his hand fell to her shoulder almost in tenderness. He offered a charming, crooked grin. "Until you saved us, Belle."

Belle fought hard not to frown in agitation and not removed his hand. She set her eyes hard on the mud strewn trail before her. "Gaston you know I did nothing. Rumpelstiltskin is the one who saved us from the ogres clutches. Without him there would be no kingdom for any of us to come back to."

"Would your beast have saved us or even cared had you not demanded him to?" Gaston parried simply. His thick brow arched in dull inquisitiveness, though he did have a fair point.

"Well no." Belle admitted uncertainly, her mouth drawn into a thin pink line. She dodged a murky puddle of rust colored water. "But I still did nothing."

"Oh enough foul talk of wars and death." Sarah interjected her plump form between the pair as was the job of a chaperone and guardian.

A blue umbrella hoisted over her head as she primly marched through the muck. One plump hand curled about her dress to hitch up her silver gown. She looked a queen out of all four of them, her head held high and her cheeks rosy from the toil of maneuvering through the mud. She regarded them both with a fond cheeriness and a hint of scolding. "What you two should be talking about is your wedding plans."

Belle frowned despite herself, drawing a small look of ire from her dear friend. "So much has to be done before we can even consider beginning planning the wedding." Lives had to be mended, the kingdom had to be rebuilt, shops, farms, homes, everything had to be seen too!

The knight shook his head resolutely towards the maid. "She's right. This is no time to be planning a wedding when everything is still in ruins." Gaston surprisingly agreed.

Taken aback by his support, the beauty smiled warmly as she nudged her guardian playfully with her elbow. "See Sarah, even Gaston agrees."

Frumpily the aged guardian remarked in a huff. "Young people." With a snort she took the lead as they neared the battered gates.

The gates to the city, once a glorious sight to behold in the realm, were frightfully worn. Hunks of wood had been hacked away and marked with gouges from blades and wide indents from battering rams. It looked as though a thousand insane woodcutters had attacked the gates. How the thick barriers were still upon their hinges seemed a miracle to the beauty.

Quite to her surprise, as they entered, Belle found more people roaming about than she had previously thought. People displaced by the rampaging ogres and left homeless milled about in the early gray dawn like wandering ghost forever subject to unrest.

Rags garbed their thin forms and sunken eyes met them with a hopelessness far too long put upon them by the threat of marauding ogres. Many slept fitfully in the streets while some lumbered about with blank stares as though they were the dead walking. To Belle it seemed the entire town was in a state of shock they were all not serving ogre masters and that the foe had been permanently repelled.

Any thought of going modestly unnoticed was dashed as they padded down the rain slick, cobblestone streets. Murmurs rumbled like thunder through the crowd as the cloaked strangers traversed the lanes. They would have had to be invisible to go unnoticed in the throng of misery.

A dirty hand pointed at one of the horses and immediately Belle knew they had spotted the war charger of Gaston and the docile, beloved Philippe who had carried the princess since early childhood.

"The princess!" A lonesome voice in the ragged crowd called out as though waking from a dream.

Belle cringed but walked on.

Instantly the shout caught like wildfire in a drought. The thought or even a dream of a noble returning seemed to put warmth in their blood and rattle them to life. People reared to life in the huts and ramshackle hovels and even the filthy blankets. Shouts arose like war horns in the sullen day, overtaking the sounds of rain. Wounded with broken arms in dirty wraps and bloodied rags lifted crutches to the dreary sky and emaciated persons cheered until their ribs could be counted against their fithly skin.

"There goes your plan for subtly." The fiend remarked sardonically as he pulled the hood further down to obscure his scales.

Gaston shot a hateful glance back to the trailing Dark One. "Watch your tongue beast." He snarled savagely and sidled closer besides his bride to be as the tumult of voices rose in a wave. Cautiously, one hand fell beneath his cloak to paw at his sword in case things became wild.

With a quick motion to Belle he nudged his head to the hunched Rumpelstiltskin. "You know you should demand he pay you more respect." The brute suggested hatefully, his jaw tight.

Hands curled into twin fist under her green and gold cloak, the beauty bit down hard upon her tongue and forced herself not to snap upon her beau. He had taken to calling Rum 'beast' and always shooting him hateful glares that held testament to his loathing. But now, she knew in the middle of the street with citizens cheering their names, was not the time to scold the knight.

Spirits were high and she was loathe to dash them.

As they walked the slick cobble stone pathways leading to the ravaged palace the screams had culminated into a roar of delight. People lined the rubble, litter strewn streets waving colorful or blood stained kerchiefs and spouting well wishes to the returning princess and her betrothed. If the king was allowing the beloved Belle back home then all truly was coming back to the dawn of peace!

After what felt akin to an eternity to the beauty being bombarded with cheers she most certainly did not deserve in her estimation, they finally finished the last step towards the damaged palace. Huge black iron gates arched towards the gray firmament, barring their path. In the past it had been a rare occurrence for the gates to be shut, and now a host of sentries guarded the way to the palace.

Behind them a multitude of people in rags and riches trailed the quartet with loud cheering and screaming the names of Gaston and Belle. The pair was beloved by their people; Gaston for his handsomeness and skill with weapons and Belle for her kind gentleness and beauty.

Guardsmen on duty straightened like arrows as the quartet drew close. Saluting briskly they hurriedly opened the thick, well oiled gates and ferried them inside the flag stone courtyard.

The ragged refugees from demolished villages and homes brought to ruin and the brink of destruction scuttled inside filling the courtyard with curious onlookers and well wishers. Cries arose from the crowd and from the guards who beat their spears upon their large targs in joy.

From the finely carved, double door entrance that led into the palace, a well rounded man donned in rich, speckled ermine and wool wobbled out followed by a host of guards and courtiers.

Silence fell upon the courtyard as the richly attired, aging soul stared from out under the awning. His eyes puckered into the dribbling rain as though trying to surmise for himself if the cheers were true.

Slowly, the beauty withdrew the cowl from her head. Her features, so like her mothers, grinned warmly at her father.

"Can it be?" The corpulent fellow's eyes glittered in joy. His jowls and stomach quivered merrily under his fine sash of red and robe of rich burgundy as he forwent anything over his head to meet his daughter in the rain. "Can it be my daughter Belle?"

A brilliant smile alight the beauty's face as though making the gray, curdled clouds dissipate into shreds for just a moment. "Papa!" The beauty exclaimed happily.

Boots slapped wetly against the slick flagstones as they neared. The pair met in a collision of joy tendered by long departure.

For Belle, her father was the only family she had left in the world and she had missed him dearly while exiled to the cottage for her safety. His scent of mulled trading spices that normally lingered on his neck washed over her sending her back to pleasanter times when she'd been a sprightly young lass on her father's knee.

"Oh my girl!" Maurice petted her wetting russet hair as he hugged her close. Even in the deluge of rain the sheen of tears stood out streaming upon his corpulent face.

From behind the hearty, sturdy voice of Gaston broke in with a hardy laugh. He dipped a knightly bow. "My king I swore to bring you daughter back safety and that I have."

"Yes." The king smiled widely, pride lacing his tone. "And know that our kingdom is secure and my daughter back in her proper home we can finally being to rebuild our homes and lives!"

The ragged souls who thronged the wet flag stones set up a resounding cheer that seemed to shake the much damaged stones of the castle. Hope came in the wake of their returned monarch and with their zeal to once more be great and prosperous.

"Good king not only has your daughter returned but she brings the thing that saved our land!" Gaston revealed with a malicious grin, his laughter now black and harsh. Cruelty darkened over his face, settling Belle ill at ease.

He wasn't? Would he?

The smile flattered warily from the beauty's features at the proclamation. Icy dread, colder than the rain plummeted in her belly. She had detailed in her mind how to bring up Rumpelstiltskin gently to her father, and now….

Gaston swaggered proudly, his mail tunic clinking, as he circled around the small, half hunched figure. He made a grand mocking gesture to the curious onlookers to draw their attention to the scrawny, cloaked soul. "This thing is indeed the creature that saved our very lives from the slavery of ogres. I give you our savior, the beast." With that, the knight yanked the cowl from the Dark One's head.

A near simultaneous gasp arose from the crowd.

"What is that thing?" A stranger in the crowd blurted.

Another let out a shrill shriek. "Demon! Hell spawn!"

"Pin it down!"

"Drive it away."

"What manner of man is that?"

Guards fingered their battered weapons anxiously, townsmen stared and pointed in horror to see the gray-gold flesh, and even Maurice staggered a step back in surprise at the thing that was not quite man.

Rain brooked from Rumpelstiltskin's straggly, matted hair and coursed over his scales making them shimmer. If he was even affected by Gaston's display he never allowed it to show upon his features, but kept the same self assured, sly grin that put others ill at ease.

The king stared at the Dark One with unabashed fear and disgust. "What is that?"

Belle's eyes narrowed hatefully towards her husband to be. How could he have done such a thing? "Papa." The beauty soothed tenderly as she patted her fathers gnarled, liver spotted hand. "It's alright, he won't harm anyone."

"Get it out of here." Maurice snarled to ward of the fear he felt surge though him. Clutching at his rain sopped robe, the king stared steely eyed at the smirking, at ease fiend. "I don't want to see It. I don't like It."

The ragged crowd stirred uneasily in agreement.

An exasperated sigh escaped the beauty's lips. If only Gaston hadn't wished to seek revenge, if only people did not react to his oddity every time he appeared like a bunch of witless barbarians! "Rum will you please wait in the library." She asked using the last of her calmness though she felt far from tranquil. Fury towards Gaston and her people flinted like sparks of flame in her eyes. Willfully she stoically fought the urge to touch the dagger beneath the folds of her traveling dress for comfort.

"Yes mistress." The fiend bowed deeply.

Townsmen gasped in astonishment as the odd scaled creature was enveloped and disappeared in a cloud of purple haze. One moment he had stood there and the next only a faint lingering odor drifted on the rain swept wind. What manner of devious monster had their fair Lady wrought?

"You shouldn't have done that, Gaston. That was cruel." Belle reprimanded lowly, her sapphire eyes smoldering with barely suppressed rage.

The brutish knight bowed as though mocking the Dark One. "I was only giving him the honor he deserved for saving our people."

Before her tongue could sting in outrage, her father interjected diplomatically, not wishing to see the moment spoiled. A wane smile carved upon his corpulent visage as he began to maneuver his daughter into the safety of the mangled citadel. "Now now, we can forget about that beast at present; we have so much to do. Workers have to be hired, supplies bought, and of course the celebration for our victory and the return of the princess. "

Belle sought to argue the matter, but quelled her rage. Now was not the time, standing in front of their people to argue with either men in her life. Nodding obediently she bit her tongue once more and allowed her father to lead her inside.

On a whim, the beauty tilted her head up she squinted into the rain she searched the large windows not shattered by the siege.

The gray-gold features of the Dark One stared down. His mouth was a thin line and his arms crossed telling Belle instinctively, though she could not tell why, that though he had not betrayed his emotions in the crowd he had been less than pleased being made a mockery. His onyx eyes trailed her until she disappeared inside the damaged citadel and even then she could feel his presence by the warmth of the dagger against her flesh.

No, Belle promised herself fervidly as she entered the warmth of the palace. Contrary to what her father suggested, she would not 'forget about the beast'.

~8~8~

"Absolutely not, Belle!" Maurice pounded his meaty fist in agitation against the richly adorned desk in his war council room. His nostrils flared angrily as he growled exasperatedly. "After all you've spoken of this 'Dark One' I will not allow It a room so close to yours or anywhere in my castle!"

The only thing she had talked about since she arrived was the strange creature she had brought along. Instead of forgetting him she'd made it a point to discuss things with her father and now she wanted him shown proper accommodations reserved for decent folk.

Belle's jaw clenched in a vice. Her eyes sparked in a conflagration for a fight as she stared her father down. She had always been a stubborn woman just as her mother had been. "Where are we to house him then, Papa? I can't trust him yet to be outside the castle gates. He will try to gain freedom and if he does it will not be good for any of us." She warned direly.

Of course she had doled out a few crumbs of information about Rumpelstiltskin here and there where it mattered, but on a whole she had strayed away from his weakness and other dire words. If her Papa knew the threat he would have had her Rum bound and shackled for what little good it would have done.

The portly king cleared his throat sagacious, slightly wilting in the heat of his daughter's fervor. He had never been a fighter even when battling with his family. A plump hand patted his rich attire smoothing out wrinkles. At the moment anything was better than looking into her querulous eyes. "I thought that perhaps the old dungeons under the castle would be a suitable place to cage It."

"Papa!" Belle turned upon him in outrage. Her hands balled into fist by her side. Heat coiled about her heart like a serpent with its fangs bared viciously. For two days she had watched the Dark One be looked upon warily and whispered about and grimaced at in disgust. He had saved all their lives and they treated him as such a curiosity and repulsed him.

"For the man who saved our kingdom you would toss him into a dungeon we haven't even used for criminals in over a hundred years of our family's history?" She asked, feeling her outrage kindle to an inferno.

The dungeon per say was not actually a dungeon at all but rather extensive caverns tunneled out by millennia of water under the stronghold. Long ago prisoners had been sent to rot in the dungeons and many died simply because the dark ominous caverns were so labyrinthine and large, inmates became hopelessly lost or died in unknown perils that lurked the blackness. The caverns were a forgotten, plaintive place none dared go.

There were only three entrances known and one could only be gotten to through raging waters that lapped against rocks that were sharper than freshly forged daggers. Another was gated with rusted bars where they had tossed prisoners. The last was an old secured door hidden behind a detailed tapestry somewhere in the castle.

"Well…" Maurice fumbled, his eyes darting uneasily.

"If Gaston had saved the day you would have ordered all pomp that we could managed to gather to be lavished upon him in a heroes welcome home." Belle argued tenaciously, venting the rising injustice that burned through her like a beacon.

The king frowned dourly. "You think to compare this thing to Gaston?" He asked in disbelief.

A cry of frustrated rage screeched from Belle's lips. Infuriated the beauty turned upon her heel to the council doors. "He will not stay in the dungeon!" She proclaimed determinedly as she marched away.

Maurice jumped as the door slammed behind her. "That girl." He murmured tiredly and ran a hand through his thinning hoary hair. While he loved his daughter dearly, even he had to admit she was a strange girl and even more so going about defending this monster…creature…thing.

~8~8~

What had gotten into everyone! Belle seethed in the frustration of it all as she traversed the cleaned corridors of her home. All about her, happy servants curtsied and bowed with smiles upon their faces as they hurried to do their chores. They wished her happy returns and cheered at times but she never returned their greeting bid from glad hearts.

Though she felt a spark of guilt not greeting them properly as she would have normally done, the thought of her Rum being treated as though he were some wild, rabid animal set her blood to boil though for the life of her she could not figure out why. Perhaps it was merely the injustice of it all, she concluded duly. He had saved their land and they rewarded him with sneers of revulsions and desire to see him chained and put in a cage. Rage welled inside her even thinking of the looks at the pointing he received.

After nurturing her anger and winding up the spires of stair wells and lavish halls, the beauty came to the doors of her one place of peace in the palace, her sanctuary of sorts - the library.

The library was a far too small affair in Belle's estimation. Scant few ever willingly sought out the library and none of the tittering lady's in waiting or courtiers she'd known. The room was the smallest in the grand castle and except for the occasional dusting she did herself the chamber fell prey to dirt and the ills of unkemptness.

For a moment the rage of frustration drained from her blood filling her with a melancholic tranquility. A sad smile twitched upon her lips as her hand rested on the cool wood of the nondescript door. Out of all the wonders and extravagance of her father's palace she missed the small library the most. All of her joy to be home rested in the one chamber.

Memories of being nestled by the window as warm sun streamed through the circular room wove through her mind as she reminisced being cut away from the world for hours lost in the few books she had wheedled her father into purchasing. She recalled a younger Sarah calling for her as she hid in one of her many hiding place as a young lass, dreading to be pulled away from her precious books and forced into tasks thought proper for those nobly born.

With a sigh the beauty staunchly shook the wonderful memories away. Entering the sanctuary she could not help but grin at the books that lined the shelves. Seeing the tomes tucked into the walls was akin to revisiting old friends.

The room was indeed filthy, but she begrudged no one for not cleaning the chamber. Everything was exactly the way she had left it. Even her absolute favorite books still rested on the small, rickety table in the room as though awaiting for her to turn their yellowed pages.

"Decided what to use me for already, Dearie?" The Dark One chirped lazily in his falsetto timbre.

The fiend sat easily upon the window seal, his legs crossed and his back to the fogged, spider worked panes. A sinister glint sparked in his eyes as he stared at his mistress with an air of hatred suppressed with obedience.

Belle sniffed the aroma of old paper and ink fondly as she crossed the threshold. She closed the door behind her with an audile bang. "Hardly." She replied with a softness that pathetically hid her anger. Her fingertips trailed over the dusty spines of the books that had grown ragged and fringed with age and disrepair.

"I was deciding where you were going to stay." The beauty remarked. A mirthless laugh blurted sardonically forms her pursed lips. "My father wanted you to live in the dungeons, but I won't let that happen. You will have a room here in the castle like any guest."

"Ah, but you see mistress I am not a guest. I am a slave. And dungeons are not that terrible." Rumpelstiltskin explained delicately with a small grin. He tented his black talons in a loose pyramid as he eased from his perch.

Belle groused, but could not keep the curiosity out her timbre. "The way you say it, you sound as though you want to stay in the dungeon."

"I would prefer it, mistress." He retorted, his voice humble as he stared down.

The beauty paused in surprise, her head swiveling to the fiend. Who could willingly want to stay in the dank dungeons below the castle? "You would? Why?"

"I have to keep my sterling reputation." He cackled impishly, his eyes alight in feral madness. At the moment he looked the beast, Gaston proclaimed he was. "A monster is not a monster without its lair."

Brow knit confusedly the beauty nodded uncertainly. She would not deny him choices and certain length of free will if she could help it, and having him in the dungeon would balm the anger blistered upon her father. "Certainly if you want to stay in the dungeon I won't stop you. I warn you though the dungeons is massive."

"Even better!" He crowed pleased and clapped his hands together like a giddy child.

Belle tossed her head trying to hold back a smile at his mirth. Who would be happy about a fetid cell? "Well if that's what you want I'll show you to your room."

The dungeons sprawled in miles of pockmarked winding caverns below the lavish castle. Biting wind wailed through the gaping holes like the screams of those who met their ghastly demise centuries at the hands of starvation or worse. Chipped stalagmites and stalactites rose like perilous fangs in the midnight darkness awaiting to devour a lost soul. A singular drop of water plopped steadily somewhere in the belly of the caverns into a pool making the noise resound about the frigid stone in a distinct, low echo.

Belle shivered as she stood at the base of the rough hewn steps that led down to the caverns. Shadows flickered crazily about in the murky darkness making her features dance in the somber, bickering light that failed to cut through the darkness. Her breath steamed from her lips in milky vapors holding testament to the chill.

Yellowed bones draped in tatters of the long deceased clumped in piles or alone in some cranny of rock. Large rats scurried in and out of the shadows, their thick pink tails hoisted proudly in their domain as they scuttled away from the foreign light that was anathema to their beady, milky eyes.

The stench of death drifted upon the musty, foul air, making shivers run along the beauty's spine. No man would have willingly desired to stay in the wretched place.

"Home sweet home!" Rumpelstiltskin trilled as he nimbly descended the slick stairs. Turning back to Belle he dipped a curt bow. "With the mistress' permission I would like to bring things from my former home here."

Of course even in his captivity he could not let his machinations for hundreds of years fall into disarray simply because he was enthralled. There were potions to ply his skills at and lives to tamper with on occasion as he worked relentlessly to be free.

"Your home?" Belle echoed surprisingly. She blinked rapidly as the sudden realization hit like a lash of lightening. Guilt welled in her depths of her soul and squeezed her heart with its wretched claws. "You did have a home before all this didn't you?" She asked lowly.

He snorted in derision, his twisted visage oblique in the shadow. If only she knew his stronghold had been an ominous castle nestled in the midst of the snowy mountains. "Obviously."

In truth the Dark Castle had never been a home to him, but that was where he lurked when the world had no need of him and things had to run their own course. His citadel was a lonely mausoleum of stone, but kept the prying eyes and the sneers away.

"I'm so sorry." Belle stammered dourly, her mind whirling to locate the proper words of comfort. She was the one who had taken him from his home. "I never even gave a thought to the home you might be away from or people you care about. It was terrible of me not to think of something so important."

A flitting chuckle parted from the Dark One's lips. "You're a strange thing you know; trying to be kind to me, Dearie." He remarked thoughtfully. "Oh but never fear all that's important I can relocate and I have no one to wring their hands in worry over my disappearance."

No one in this world cared about him. Bae had been the only one to care for him, and he was gone leaving him in a world who despised him no matter what form he took be he cripple or Dark One.

For a moment the beauty thought she spotted pain dash across his features with a flicker of light before dashing the foolish notion away.

"Very well then." She replied uncertainly. The dull echo of her steps tramped up the slimy steps. "I'll give you time to get settled then. I think we'll both be busy tomorrow." Gold was scarce and so was food. People needed to be healed and lives repaired not to mention whatever else that had to be done. She did not enjoy ordering him about, but to have him and not try to mend the brokenness of their kingdom would have been a sin on her people as well.

"Rum." She spoke his name softly like a wish. Part of her could not explain why his name always felt warm on her tongue, but she enjoyed the feeling like a child enjoyed sweets. She stared at the old, thick door, not turning to face him. "You will always have a room upstairs if you desire it." With that she placed the pathetically flickering torch in a niche carved into the slimy rock and departed.

Alone, the Dark One stared at the shut door ponderously as though absorbing her words through his very skin. Most everything she did and said seemed odd.

His mistress was indeed very strange. She was different from any wielder of the blade in existence. Though she could have asked for anything or simply forgotten him she had spent more time in his defense than actually commanding him. Had he asked she would have allotted him a room and treated him as a guest in her household.

She treated him like a favored slave and for the life of him, Rumpelstiltskin could not tell why.

Despite himself a small grin inched upon his lips towards his strange…odd… _endearing_, yes that was the word, he noted to himself promptly, endearing mistress.


	7. Webs of Gold and Kindness

_A/N: Thanks for reading and all the stellar reviews guys and gals! :3 _

**~8~8~**

The sun was barely a thought tingeing the charcoal, gray firmament as Belle lurked the tapestry clung walls that hid any blemish the marauding ogres had wrought. Her quick, light steps nimbly avoided bleary eyed servants that lumbered, disgruntled, like the dead awakened. They sluggishly staggered in a trickle of one or two to get their morning chores done promptly; never giving noticed to the cloaked figured who hastened like an ageless hovering phantom through the dimly lit corridors.

For once Belle praised the rigors of early morning chores back at the cottage which had her rising far before the sun. Her mind was fresh and clear to bolster herself for the terror she assumed lay in wait down in the belly of the dungeon.

There was no denying he was a dangerous man and if the legends were to be believed, even by a mite, his cruel reputation marked him as a man to be feared with just cause. The tales of his spine tingling horrors would make the toughest of mercenaries tremble violently if they knew he was real and those blood chilling stories were perhaps the ones that a lucky few had survived to tell!

In her fertile imagination she could well imagine what had taken up residence in the dungeons. Bleached skulls skewered upon blood rusted chains that swung from the vaulted stone ceiling and books bound in flesh of those who had met ill fates at his hand. She shivered uneasily, her gut churning nauseously, at the thought of black magic scrolls penned in the blood of murders to summon curses and plagues and madness all at his fingertips and now under her father's castle.

Her hand rested uncertainly on the thick, tarnished latch that led down to the dungeons. Nerves thrilled tremulously in her body, setting her blood afire. Lowly, the beauty promised herself staunchly to be brave. She would not stare, she refused to run in terror, and she refused to give him the satisfaction of fear even if she were shaking so badly she could hardly stand.

Gritting her teeth stoically to ward of her trepidation, she braced herself and turned the latch.

Belle blinked in breath taking astonishment as she surreptitiously entered the forever frigid, but newly furbished accommodations of the Dark One. Before the beauty quietly traversed the dark, richly adorned halls, she had stoically prepared herself for true horrors to assail her when she ventured down to his "lair" as he wished to term his new home. Nothing had prepared her for his changes.

Gazing in the vast, dankly illuminated caverns his new home was nothing like she could fathom. The day before only splintered, yellowed bones of prisoners and hungry rats that scurried into the darkness had lain upon the stone.

In their place, glass bottles and phials of all shapes and measurements sat along the roughened stone ledges that now served as shelves. A few gargantuan stalagmites were obviously shorn by magical means of their fanged tips to make room as tables or more shelves.

The extensive collection of vials glowed in a myriad of vibrant, glimmering hues in the dim light of merrily flickering torches that pockmarked the shrouded, near physical darkness in the dreary caverns. Eerie golden light from the magical torches somberly licked at the intense shadow. Each light, though meager, penetrated the sordid blackness like souls lost in the darkest pits of Tartarus.

No matter of light could ever dash the darkness completely, Belle surmised wryly to mask her curiosity mingled with the fright she felt.

A mass of mulled colored furs lay strewn in an adumbrated patch of stone. One dirty blanket was balled up upon the pile of pelts. She had to wonder if that was his bed. Why would he choose to sleep so terribly on a cold stone floor when there were plenty of beds he could have chosen and probably conjured? Tucking the ponderous thought away for later she harried on to view the wonders of his domain.

In one corner an ancient spinning wheel she'd only seen in the poorest of peasant huts and a store of tawny straw sat nestled almost obscurely away from curious eyes. The large wheel was old and the rusted spindles seemed archaic to the looms well to do seamstresses used.

Curiosity sparked at such an oddity in the home of the infamous Dark One, Belle crept to the rickety wheel hesitantly. Her brow crinkled in thin lines of thoughtfulness as she neared cautiously. Why would he have such a strange thing more befitting a spinner than a puissant magician? And why was there a heap of straw next to such a thing instead of sacks of un-spun wool?

"It's not polite sneaking into someone's home, Dearie." Rumpelstiltskin cackled mischievously from behind as though he had simply coalesced from the chill air.

Belle jumped involuntarily at the unexpected trill. Startled, the beauty leapt away from the wheel.

Crimson suffused her cheeks in a blush of embarrassment towards getting caught. She hadn't meant to invade his privacy but the curiosity of what he desired to bring along with him had plagued her mind all night. She'd tossed and turned in her lavish, silken bed thinking of her Rum, though she didn't know why her mind always rambled back to him, and the trinkets he would have magically summoned to his lair. Morbid curiosity, perhaps, but curiosity just the same.

The beauty dipped her head slightly hiding her abashed tint. Her russet mane curtained her face hiding her blush from his peering eyes. "Forgive me; my curiosity can overwhelm me at times."

A strange sound rumbled in the Dark One's throat. "Curiosity can be dangerous thing, mistress." He chided pleasantly and stalked towards his coveted potions.

Prisms of multihued light danced across his visage in series of oddly beautiful patterns. Gaston would have looked ugly and brutish in the twinkling radiance compared to the soft slants of light that made his skin glow.

Breath hitched tightly in the beauty's throat as she realized with startling appall she was staring at his scales and comparing him to the handsome Gaston. A blush dared to surge once more upon her cheeks, but she suppressed the hue.

Oblivious to her raging, embarrassed thoughts, he tittered impishly. "Curiosity has killed more people than any war ever has." He remarked simply. "We wouldn't want you to be added to that list would we my mistress?"

"Are you threatening me?" She shook off the strange, alarming thoughts that flowed for him and asked good naturedly; oddly comfortable around the man that sought to destroy her.

Without his dagger, his bite, at least to her and her people, was gone.

Taking a step away from his jars and potions as though making certain all was in its perfect place, he grinned easily and offered a deep bow. "Nay mistress. It was only a warning."

"Well thank you." She cleared her throat attempting to sound confident. A hand fell to the blade reassuringly to bolster her thoughts. Forcing the tensed moment away from her mind, the beauty motioned her hand to the twinkling vials, her face alight with raging curiosity. "What is all this, Rum?"

"Potions I've made and traded for, mistress." The fiend replied obediently.

To display his toils he plucked a glimmering red vial from its perch to display. Black talons clinked lightly upon the glass as he proffered the elixir out subserviently. "This, for instance, is a potion of invisibility." He explained officiously. "All that needs to be done is to drink and you'll become invisible for an hour before resuming your visible self; a good serum for spying."

"And what of the spinner's wheel?" Belle inquired softly. Her eyes darted back to the circular wood.

A thin grimaced flattened the Dark One's lips into a pale line, but he did not try to fight the powers that compelled him to speak. "The wheel has the ability to turn mere straw into gold."

"Gold?" She echoed in awe. Her eyes widened as she turned fully to the spinners wheel. "You mean, real, valuable gold?"

"Of course mistress." He nodded casually. "Over the years I have spun so much straw into gold the wealth of my hoard could support this kingdom and another for several lifetimes over. Even now I have much of it stored in deeper portions of my new home."

She cast a curious glance to his direction. His face was blank as though he carefully stored away memories that whirled in the back of his age old mind. "If you have so much gold then why do you still spin?" Belle queried.

Silence reigned in the dark caverns; the only sound the softly shrieking wind. For a moment she feared he would not, or could not reply.

"I like to watch the wheel." He remarked lowly after a time, his shoulders heaving in a near imperceptible shrug. Sadness faintly trailed his words. "It helps me forget."

"Forget what?" She inquired softly though she felt a sting of regret for prying. It was not an order for him to speak the truth or even deign to reply, but she could not allowed her curiosity to go un-sated.

His features clouded ponderously with long ago thoughts; lights shimmering over his grayed skin. For a moment Belle did not look upon gray-gold skinned creatures but a very tired man. In half a heartbeat the disguise of cunning malice fell back to its proper place pushing away the man and displaying the beast.

A devious grin stretched across his lips as he let forth a strange tittering chuckle. "I guess it worked."

Soft laughter bubbled from the beauty's lips at his quip. At times spattering of his humor could rouse a chuckle unlike Gaston whom she had never once laughed at his boorish humor.

Without thinking, Belle shoved his arm playfully. The small action, so normal, so playful, made them both rigid. Here they were bantering like acquaintances instead of her doling out orders and he bustling to obey.

Awkwardness sung about them like the drafty air that wailed in the caverns.

Why had she done that? Belle pondered almost in panic. Not only had she compared him to Gaston once more, but also just for a moment treated him as she would have an old friend.

Too frightened to face him to gauge his reaction she stared at the wheel with an intensity that could have set the wood aflame.

Why had they been prattling so easily as though they had known one another longer than four days? No one else in the kingdom would come within three feet of him much less laugh and jest and prod the monster of nightmare.

The Dark One cleared his throat loudly as though forcefully banishing the sudden tsunami of awkwardness back into the darkest reaches of his lair. "I suppose you will of course want the gold taken up to the castle." He questioned humbly, keeping to his guise of willing servant.

"If it's not too much trouble. I hope you don't mind so greatly us taking the fruits of your labor." She nodded and forced a serene smile.

"All of it became yours when you became my owner, mistress." Rumpelstiltksin supplied, his tone dry and hard as the stone.

Though he would have rather been tortured than to admit a fault, his mistress honestly confused him at times. She constantly gave thought to his feelings and for the life of him he could not fathom why. His mistress had no compulsion of propriety to ask him politely even for a command; she thought of him on her own.

The beauty gave a sigh, relief flooding her person as the awkwardness alleviated. "It's not mine. You made it and I am simply asking for some."

"Then by all means." He flourished an exaggerate bow and proffered his talons to a darker caverns nestled in the semi-darkness. "What's mine is yours."

"Later." Belle turned back to the opened portal. The alabaster light that streamed from the door slanted down like a gaping maw into the harrowing darkness. To the Dark One, he could not help but notice the way the light made her azure orbs sparkle merrily. Despite himself he felt the peculiar twitch in his lips, though fought the urge down stoically.

"Now." She nudged her head to the door. "Let's go find some breakfast before the castle is fully awake."

Rumpelstiltskin stepped back suspiciously; once more a stand-off creature that disliked the mortals he dealt with. "Unless that is a command, mistress, I don't think I shall."

"You're not hungry?" She queried slightly curious.

"I'm not too fond of people screaming in abject terror." He fluttered his wiry talons lackadaisically feigning boredom. "I'd rather have a peaceful meal below than above. Worry not, I can conjure food at a whim."

Belle nodded uncertainly, displeasure across her features. "Alright if that's how you want it. But I will send a meal down; a _good _meal."

"Thank you mistress." He bowed reverently, mildly amused how she disliked him using magic for simple things. "In the mean time I shall work to transport a healthy cache of gold above…."

~8~8~

"All this gold." Maurice muttered numbly in stark amazement. The merchant king stared, his eyes like twin moons, at the large wicker baskets brimming with glimmering golden thread before him.

Though the beast his daughter Belle had subjugated had summoned the baskets into the castle proper, each large vessel had taken two sturdy guardsmen to lift their packed persons and bring them to his study.

How the fibers glittered! Each sparkled in a dazzling display that coiled neatly in the vessels.

Plodding dazedly to the heaping baskets he dug his thick fingers through the threads. Cold gold did indeed meet his thick hands. On a whim he lofted a weighty handful to sniff the strands. He had dealt in and smelled and weighed and held gold enough in his long life to know the strands were no mere trick made to look like gold. It was real, and all his.

Leaning against a tapestry laden wall, Belle gazed at her father in barely disguised disapproval. The light in his eyes and the honey glow from the gold radiating upon his corpulent face put her ill at ease. Wealth such as their kingdom had never known stood in front of him and he was drinking in the sight as a drunkard did a keg of mead.

He turned his head slightly to his daughter but did not look at her directly. Too Belle it seemed as though his eyes were forcefully riveted to the strings of gold. "And you say your beast has much, much more down below?"

"Yes Papa." Belle sighed lowly. She wanted him to be happy with the gift and see the usefulness of Rumpelstiltksin, but still all he saw was a creature who could do a few wondrous tricks.

Maurice rumbled a throaty chuckle like faraway thunder. He patted his girth happily and wobbled away to his daughter. "We'll be the wealthiest kingdom for leagues around!" He exclaimed and waved his hands in all directions in his excitement. "We'll repair the kingdom and make the castle bigger and better! We won't be ignored as some lowly, lesser kingdom not fit to be looked upon any longer! We'll be attending balls right in the court of Queen Regina herself!"

"Papa." Belle began to pull her father back down to earth, but he was drunk upon the thrill of wealth once more. So long had the ogres assaulted them he had watched bitterly as his coffers had been drained to only a few handfuls of gold.

Shaking her head somberly the beauty departed. Agitation brimmed in her heart as she forced herself into a calm, languorous pace through the hall. He would not miser the wealth but spread it out to the people, though Belle wished he was not so obsessed with riches. There was a time when he had been more inventor than king; a portly, cheery man everyone loved to call "crazy old Maurice" for his mind boggling inventions. But those days were gone and the man she fondly remembered tinkering with contraptions, as she helped, an old memory.

At least she noted gratefully, Gaston had departed early in the morning to attend his fiefdom halfway across the battered kingdom. His family owned a sizable portion of land and indeed had Belle's family not ruled so long they would have had the kingdom.

The knight would not return for a fortnight to get his accounts and assess the damage of his age old home and lands. There had been much prettied words of his promise to think of her always and Sarah dabbing her eyes, but at last he had gone.

The memory of seeing him canter out the gates, slightly lifted her spirits. As she reached the door leading down to the Dark One's lair, her temper had cooled to true worry.

A dire, gray frown pierced her normally cheery features. What would happen now that they had a near infinite supply of gold? Gold could do much but it couldn't replace limbs or bring family back to life or even fix a broken mind of those caught in the worst of the ogre's wrath.

Would her father only think of gold? What would happen with the townsmen found out?

"I take it your father was pleased with my gift of gold?" The fiend chirped inquisitively as Belle entered.

"Thrilled." She remarked sullenly, her mouth twisted into a grimace. "I haven't seen him look happier in years."

The Dark One bowed humbly. "The mistress is pleased I trust?"

"I'm pleased that my people now have sufficient funds to rebuild their lives." Belle admitted dourly. In truth the look of pleasure upon her fathers face disgusted her. To think he loved dross more than happiness of his people made her stomach churn far more sickeningly than the severed ogre head her Rum had laid at her feet.

"May I ask what you came for then if you are please?" He inquired, a brow perched.

The beauty suppressed a shiver in the linger cold of the draft. Gripping her arms tightly to ward off the bite of chill she smile slightly. "I came to ask if you would join me and my father for dinner."

If she could convince her father he wasn't a beastly monster, the rest would fall in order.

"Hardly." Rumpelstiltskin snorted derisively as though her words were those spoken of a foolish girl. "I will do what you bid mistress, but surely you cannot think I will use the time freely offered to lurk above with you…mortals." He darkly spat the last word as though it were filthy.

He did not have time for mortals to shoot him disgusted, wary glances or run in terror of him. Did she honestly think he would willingly accompany her anywhere when not commanded?

The beauty motioned her hand around the sinister, dim lair. "Are you honesty just going to spend all your time skulking about down here when not busy?"

Pity surged through the beauty even with the thought of having to lurk in the dankness and misery as a singular lonely soul in the gaping teeth of chasms. She would not have wished the dungeon on her worst enemy, much less Rum.

"If I can help it." He acknowledged freely. Pivoting on his heel he turned from her as he padded to his spinners wheel. Glimmerings string wound about the spool testified he had been busy at the wheel transmuting more straw into gold.

There was still so much to accomplish before plans were put into place for Regina and Snow and David. Their little bundle of joy was not even a thought and even now they were little more than strangers to one another; Snow an outlaw and David still a shepherds son.

Strands lay unwoven he could not let rest idle. To spin his plans he could ill afford to halt his twisting and cording and knotting to bind the ties and fates of all simply because his life was no longer his own.

From the corner of his eyes he saw his mistress' lips twist in dissatisfaction. Words she wished to spew danced upon the tip of her tongue, and yet she kept them back tightly.

"Fine." Belle steadied herself with a deep breath. A glint in her eyes the Dark One did not recognize yet sparkled in her azure orbs. Had he known the glimmer in her eyes he would have known her cunning was afoot. "I understand; you're not thrilled to associate with us."

With that the beauty dipped a respectfully crusty and departed.

Leaning over his wheel, the fiend could not help but listen as she departed. Her every step resounded upon the knife like pinnacles shooting up and down from the stone roof and cavern floor. Everywhere about him he heard her and the sound was more than just the echo; the sound seemed almost to drum in his heart.

"Dinner." He huffed sardonically as though the word was sheer, fool nonsense. Wood creaked in a teeth grinding shriek throughout the dankness of the dungeon as he slowly worked the wheel.

To offer him dinner? Did she expect him to arrive in the grand hall donned in his finest leather to beg for scraps for their amusement? Did they want him to put on a magic show for others of their status? Did they want to fuel the morbid curiosity in all humans and stare at the beast in man-flesh? Or, he paused the cycle of the wheel thoughtfully, his visage clouded in a spark of confusion, did she truly mean to invite him like a guest and not as a slave to mock?

Since she had become his owner she had never tried to be cruel, but that was a different time when she was stuck in exiled poverty of a stone cottage. In exile, she was imperiled of being a princess with no nation, and not completely certain of his powers and the control she possessed. Now she was back in lavish means and completely certain in her powers to keep him upon a leash.

Ever since they had arrived his ever changing plans had noted the people about her and the type of mortals they were. If she were truly any different then she was as strange an anomaly as himself!

Surely she could not mean to keep up the notably good veiled charade of tenderness. Though his mistress was kind, he was certain now by observing nobles and her ass of a betrothed and father, it was only a matter of time till she allowed herself to no doubt succumb to the fawning and narcissism of the noble breed; eradicating such goodness and making his job easier.

He knew from experience how differently a person could change back in the grip of power and fortune. Had that not happened to himself?

Of course, he noted almost in a derisive snort, he could have been wrong, but to think she was nothing like the people of the noble world would have been rarer than a pink pearl.

With a dark sneer that bared his yellow and black teeth he tugged the wheel with a vicious fury sending the spindle twirling crazily upon its rusted needle. No, he remarked to himself, given time she would show the noble attitude bred in her and the kindness she displayed would undoubtedly fade.

Surely her guise would falter to her true nature of any greedy, selfish noble like the rest of them. No matter how good or kind those things never lasted with nobles of her caliber.

Surely he would see the true women soon, and alter his plans accordingly.

Surely.

~8~8~

"Mistress?" The fiend arched a brow curiously. He steepled his finger delicately as he gauged her intently. "What are you doing so here so late?"

A large, silver tray laden with steaming dishes rested in her strong grip. Chill air whipped the mouth watering aroma of basted boar and spiced vegetables temptingly in the draft. The scent of raspberry tea aromatically floated upon the gently whistling currents.

A smile etched upon her lips as she set the silver gilt tray on a wide, flat stalagmite. "I brought dinner for us."

"Us?" He echoed incredulously, his eyes perusing the platter. He had assumed dinner would have come the same breakfast had; by a terrified maid who laid the haphazard meal on the edge of the very top step and ran for dear life when he snarled at her.

Belle smiled softly and placed the plates upon the cool stone. "Yes us. I won't have you live your life alone down here."

"Why?" The Dark One's eyes flashed with confusion at her strange words; a thing he all too often found himself when about his mistress. He dared a tenuous step closer to the delicious meal tempted by the smells tantalizing his senses. Real food made him far hungrier than anything he could have conjured. "Why would you do this?"

What game was she playing? Did she still think him some novelty to toy with?

"If you will not venture upstairs then you should have no qualms if I choose to spend my spare time with you." Belle replied serenely precocious. Daintily stabbing a fork into a haunch of cut meat the beauty smiled fondly and proffered to the barren seat across from hers.

"I don't think your father or betrothed would be happy if they knew you were down here with the terrifying monster." Rumpelstiltskin chuckled as he eased into the seat.

A warm laugh tumbled from her lips. "No, Papa is less than pleased, and Gaston is currently away."

"Small mercies," she nearly sighed aloud, but held the exclamation of Gaston's departure bottled securely in her soul. For a man about to be her husband, she shouldn't have felt so relived when he was absent, but she couldn't deny the light heartedness that over took her spirit and let her soar at the ease she felt blossom.

"A rebellious princess." He clucked in mocked scolding and quaffed down the brew. His manners were still atrocious. Slurping noisily he smacked his lips happily as though neither hot nor cold could affect him.

Belle tossed her head. "No, Rum, just a determined one." She parried and chewed with a smile. "At any rate until you decide you wish to join me upstairs to talk or dine or anything, I shall simply have to come down here."

"So I should grow accustomed to your announced intrusions, mistress?" He grinned behind the gilded rim of his cup.

For the third time that day Belle laughed at the Dark One. "I don't like the thought of you being holed down here like some dragon guarding a hoard of treasure. No one deserves to be alone; at least not all the time. I apologize but you will simply have to find some way to bear my company."

Her words should have sparked even a faint hint of agitation and yet he fought hard just to dash the grin from his lips. Why did she make him smile despite himself? Why did he feel no resurging anger?

In truth, he realized suddenly with more than a little surpise the thought of her coming down to see him every day was not that greatest of burdens to bear. In fact, he remarked in the very back of his mind, as long as he was to be her slave, before he could rip her heart out, of course, he might as well enjoy what little pleasantness she afforded him.

The strange, novel thought nearly made him chuckle. None ever sought company with the monster and here she was freely offering her companionship.

_"Company"._ The word nearly made the Dark One unceremoniously break into another large grin. Perhaps the distraction of her company, before he could break free and slaughter, would not be a terrible thing at all.

At least for the present, of course.

**~8~8~**

_A/N: *Cue Jaws music* She coming, guys; you knew she was. Regina is on the way! RUN FOR COVER. **She'll frekin' eat you**. Actually, Regina is not going to make a huge appearance in this tale, but I just have to include her because, well, she'd awsome and I love writing Regina! :3_


	8. Those Who Mean Ill

"My queen, tidings have come from the besieged realm of King Maurice." A black plated guardsman announced reverently as he entered the gilded, marbled court of the high queen Regina, widow of king Leopold and step mother to the treasonous princess Snow White.

Regina languished upon her onyx, obsidian throne like a lazy, cunning cat awaiting a mouse to scurry by to torment. The glossy, coal hued throne was a stark contrast to the tranquil, soft white of the colonnaded chamber and light marble that always illumed the court as bright as a summers day.

A silken gown of teal attired her body, showing her sensuous curves and fair shape behind the sheer, scandalous fabric. Many lauded her as the fairest in all the land, and indeed she prided herself of her pallid face and beautiful eyes that hid her malice and dark mind behind her loveliness.

Motioning her hand in a indolent gesture that could just as well have been shooing away a curious fly, she smile evilly unable to contain her devious glee. "Come forward, messenger. I've awaited news from that bloated toad for weeks now."

Armor jangled as he neared, his sword slapping against his thigh. Kneeling dutifully at the top tier of the circular dais the warrior proffered out the neatly folded epistle laid upon a silver, oval platter. The yellowed, slightly tattered parchment was closed with a circular seal of blue wax and embedded with the signet of King Maurice; a gold coin by the sea. Even by the looks of the worn, spotted paper, she could tell the kingdom was floundering.

"That last news that arrived from that paltry little realm foretold of imminent demise." The queen revealed in a bored sigh to no one in particular. People who constantly begged for mercy and aid and alms never ceased to aggravate her.

Maurice had penned long letters, blotted liberally with either sweat or tears, relating the atrocities of the ogres and begging for aid from the powerful kingdom. He had promised gold and fealty and even his daughter so serve as a lady in waiting to Regina if she would just bolster their kingdom with troops enough to stave off the ogres.

Of course none of his begging came to fruition of sparking the faint inkling of mercy from the monarch. But they were amusing to read when she was bored of all else.

Regina's plush, ruby lips upturned in a devious grin. A soft, malicious chuckle of amusement eased from her mouth as she daintily plucked up the letter like a plump treat.

With a laconic flick of the wrist she snapped the seal away. "Are they writing for aid once again? I thought they had learned from my last messenger by hawk there is simply nothing I can do."

Her feigned words of concern brought a low chuckle from the sword bearing guardsmen who surrounded their queen. Corrupted and loyal to their devious monarch, they knew the truth and how she had more than enough men to fend away ogres but chose to watch the cities burn and her people in phthisis and ruin.

Of course if Maurice's kingdom was still afloat, some how, some way, then the note, the witch surmised, was undoubtedly the last letter to be sent before the kingdom was overtaken and her people enslaved. Perhaps even, as she took up the epistle and unfolded it, the very heart of their land was already a pile of rubble as her eyes graced the ink.

She had paid the ogres far too much gold for them to have failed their task of 'clearing away the rabble' as she termed the pathetic kingdom. True, the realm had put up a valiant fight, but the might of the ogres would have been far too strong to resist with time and the lack of means to win the day.

Once the ogres had finished their tasks and the quaint towns were in ruin and her people enslaved Regina could promptly move to claim another kingdom in her clutches and gather the remains to rebuild as she saw fit in her vastly growing kingdom.

Her husband, Leopold, had been a sickeningly fair king; never wanting more than he had and always giving to those in distress. A sneer nearly claimed her lips at the putrid ideals. One by one, little by little, she would be queen of all the land and if she had to eradicate a few shires and fiefdoms then so be it.

As the monarch lazily perused the message, her eased features of foul delight slowly crumbled into surprise then utter disbelief. Eyes wide and malicious amusement gone, she sat rigid upon her basalt throne as though struck.

The witch clutched the note in both her hands as though it suddenly weighed a great deal. Disbelief sparkled in her eyes as she murmured snippets of the note aloud as if they would awake her from a dream. "Kingdom saved…ogres annihilated…strange monster… no need for troops…?"

A pernicious shriek of rage resounded about her throne room. Guardsmen flinched anxiously, their eyes darting uncertainly to their queen. Servants who dipped in and out with buckets and mops stood still as though mice to afraid to move. The queen was upset and when she became enraged, lives were easily snuffed out in her fury.

Her spell worked hands crumpled the epistle in her scathing anger. Tongues of flame leapt from her fingertips incinerating the paper into a small pile of smoking char in her hand as the melted wax dripped from between her fingers.

"How is that possible?" She raged vehemently; her lips twisted in a furious sneer. Tossing the small pile of ash to little avail, she stomped like a petulant child. Her shaking hands curled into fists as she rose. "The ogres have never failed me before and to be thwarted by a pitiful little fiefdom of nobodies is impossible!"

There was no probable way they could have not only survived but decimated the ogres as the message bragged. To beat them was quite literally impossible. Most ogres took a score of battle hardened men to slay, not farmers and bakers wielding pitchforks and old weapons!

They could not have been victorious; not without an ironic twist of fate, or a miracle, or…magic.

Regina's gaze snapped upon the guard still kneeling upon the marble dais. His plated body under his flowing black cloak of wolf fur quivered tremulously as he still held out the silver platter not daring to move an inch least she decided to take her volatile ire out upon him.

"What are you just kneeling for like an idiot!" She roared, her eyes alight with dark fire.

A growl wrenched from between her pursed lips as the witch slapped the platter out of his grip. The terrified knight reared backwards, tumbling from the dais in a heap of armor. Plate and mail raucously echoed about the court as he landed hard. Not daring to move or moan he lay their like a turtle upon its back waiting for the queen to end his life in her fury.

The harpy pointed to the tall, alabaster doors with a singular finger that shook in rage. "Fetch me Jefferson the Hatter if you're not keen on being turned into a newt; I require his services at once!"

A disgusted sneer skewed her lush mouth as she watched the guard limp away pathetically, just grateful he had not been slain. Scoffing, Regina turned back to her throne, the stupid fool already cast away from her mind.

Her hand fell under her chin thoughtfully as she sat once more and a tense normalcy resumed through her court. All traces of glee were bereft of her face, leaving a cold fury in its wake.

With the news of the kingdom saved, the witch would have made post haste down there herself to peruse the truth. But given the circumstances to leave to see the barely survived kingdom would have been utter impropriety on her part. She was the fairest, richest queen in all the land, not some gawking peasant to stare at an anomaly!

Jefferson, however, could do a better job than she ever could. The hatter had no decorum or scruples to tout and did not need to wait nor had qualms of skulking about, which was far below her station. The mercenary haberdasher could go where no one else could tread and find out what she needed to know about the miracle and the strange monster that slew an entire tribe of ogres written in the note.

~8~8~

"And what's this herb?" Belle queried inquisitively as she gave the gnarled vegetation a curious poke. The hard plant was dark brown and curled like the hands of an elder who'd toiled hard labor all their life.

Rumpelstiltskin sighed only mildly exasperated and quickly swiveled his head from the cast iron cauldron bubbling before him. The colors in the cauldrons shimmered from angry red to mild pink, casting his scaled skin in a burnished tint. "Knuckle-root, Dearie."

Turning his absolute attention back to the simmering couldron the fiend delicately dropped a few tears of fairies into the concoction. Red medallions of the rare liquid sizzled viscously as it hit the vicious mixtures and melded perfectly into the potion.

Smiling triumphantly at the successful mingling he reached for a small, black coin purse and explained further. "The root is poisonous in its current state, and would kill you in less than a minute, but its uses in balancing out potions is utter necessity and invaluable for the potent elixirs."

Disturbed by the innocent looking plants sinister nature, Belle shied her hand away least the poison be far more potent that he mentioned. "Why do you make potions, Rum?" She inquired suddenly. The beauty stepped away from the deadly plant and crinkled her nose at the unpleasant odor of whatever he brewed in the couldron.

While his collection of flasks and potables would have made any one who dabbled in elixirs green with envy she could not fathom the use for one who had magic such as he.

The Dark One shrugged, not turning to her and sprinkled a coarse, crystal powder from the small bag into the pot. "I trade them at times. They're quite valuable." A cruel chuckle tittered from his lips. "I've seen solders kill one another over a health potion a day before battle."

Shivering more from his cruel words that the wisped draft, the beauty stared at her twisted reflection in a jasper tinted potion. "But why make them? You've got magic enough to do everything a potion could do, and better."

He sighed, his shoulder slumping in a hint of irritation. "Is this my free day or your own private inquisition?" He asked softly to hide a spark of ire.

Though the fiend never much minded her company, his mistress was curious about everything! She had questions about every plant, and wished to know what every potion did when imbibed. At time she tried to ask about his life, but always he shied from those explanations like the plague.

Of course even in the rare times she became too curious for his liking, nearing things he would rather leave unsaid and in the dark, he was grateful that she at least allowed him time for himself to even experiment with potions even though most of the time she lingered down in his dungeon with him.

Though the kingdom was being rebuilt in leaps and bounds with grand workings of magic and laborers paid with gold sting, she never forgot that even he needed rest. She often allotted him free days to do what he will if he wished to traverse the city or in his lair; but never out of the town where he could perhaps wheedle some one into his employ.

"You're right, I apologize." Belle admitted meekly, reigning in her insatiable curiosity. "I've probably been down here to long pestering you. Would you like me to leave?"

Abruptly, green vapors boiled over from the cauldron. The foul mist tumbled over the sides and crept along the cold floor.

The Dark One frowned down at the steaming, vomiting cauldron as though the mixture was not forming to what he desired. He cursed himself in a low murmur Belle couldn't catch and stared thoughtfully at the mists. A finger tapped at his chin ponderously. "You should probably leave. It seems my potion has gone awry." A thin smile snaked over his features. "We wouldn't want you to have any adverse effects. Experimented potions can be quite unpredictable."

Belle eyed the billowing cauldron, spewing gouts of mist, warily. She staggered back as the fog thickened and drew near. Opaque vapors seemed to rear up as though having a life of its own.

"I'll be back for dinner." She replied quickly, trying to seem at ease and walked with all gracious hast that dignity would allow. She refused to let the Dark One know she was frightened; refused to let him have the satisfaction of absorbing her terror.

As the door slammed shut the Dark One allowed a growl to rumble past his lips. Folding his arms he banished the potion from the cauldron with flick of the wrist. Years, years of plying his trade and he still could not achieve the potion of true love!

Of course it wouldn't have mattered if it had worked, he still would have had to dash the whole pot and make up some excuse to get her away. In the few moments after he thought the crystals had melded with the fairy tears, he knew they were not alone.

His thin smile twisted into a feral sneer. He couldn't have his mistress be around while his guest lurked in the darkness spying on them with crazed eyes.

The Dark One turned back to his work table to select new regents for his elixir to begin anew. Without turning around he spoke into the darkness. "What can I do for you this fine day, Jefferson?" Rumpelstiltskin remarked blandly, his voice holding not a hint of surprise.

The Mad Hatter strolled from the always encroaching darkness lazily as though he belonged there. A wide, Cheshire smile creased his face as he spun his battered top hat on a singular finger.

"Regina sent me to find out why this kingdom wasn't a pile of smoldering rubble." He revealed unremarkably as though the entire situation was dreadfully boring. Honoring the secrecy of his employers was not something he could tote as a virtue.

Though he often worked jobs for the queen, Rumpelstiltskin paid far better, and they both were more like minded than he and Regina. Telling him what Regina was up to was all part of his job to the Dark One.

Unimpressed confusion clouded the hatter's features as he rambled about the caverns slowly. His brow furrowed inquisitively to see the Dark One's strange wheel and his potions all sequestered in the filthy cavern as though he was determined to make the place a new home.

"You know I normally only stick to business, Rumpel, but I have to ask why did you suddenly pack up and move from the Dark Castle?" He spared a glance at the fiends as he scoured the potions.

The fiend cackled impishly. "Change of scenery, Dearie." He replied in his manically jovial way which masked the warning not to pry further. There was a threat to his tittering voice; a threat only those who knew him very well could pick up and wisely avoid.

The haberdasher shrugged nonchalantly, letting the alluded warning roll off his back in no consequence. "Who was that pretty little creature I saw just leave?" He expertly changed the subject and wandered closer to the spinners wheel. Another smile etched his features as he looked back to the door. "A new apprentice? A servant girl? Or do you have a new friend?"

Gazing down at the toxic regents in his grasp, the fiend forced himself not to show a hint of emotion though he was turned away. Black talons dug into the Knuckle-root so violently he felt the hard root snap in his grasp.

A feral protectiveness suddenly washed over him and perhaps a bit more than he could explain. Of course he would never want Jefferson to find out about the enchanted dagger, but for him to term Belle as though she were some common tavern whore as 'pretty little creature' made his black blood boil, though he didn't know for certain why.

She was beautiful, but when the admiration came from Jefferson's mouth it sounded dirty and suffused the Dark One with a rage he had never known.

"Her name is Belle." Rumpelstiltskin forced the words not to be hissed through clenched teeth. "She is princess of the kingdom."

If he had kept back such information, the hatter, he knew well, would be more intrigued than he already was. To treat everything as he normally did as some game would be best to be rid of the hatter as promptly as possible without stirring up more suspicion.

Jefferson nodded and clapped his hands happily. "All well and good. It was nice seeing you again, Rumpel and I'll just help myself to some of your gold thread."

"Oh?" The Dark One turned then, his features more amused than angry at the daring of the insane hatter. "No one steals from me, Dearie, not even you."

"It's not stealing." Jefferson snorted a laugh as though the words were preposterous. He uncoiled the glimmering thread from the wheel spool greedily. "Consider it your payment for not telling Regina you're here. Everything had a price, Rumpel, remember."

The Dark One crossed his arms, but made no motion to stop the hatter. "I could just as easily slay you on the spot, Jefferson." He observed dryly.

The hatter stood straight, but unconcerned. Golden thread hung haphazardly from his hand like garland. He winked roguishly. "Oh but I'm still useful aren't I? You would have been rid of me long ago if I wasn't."

The fiend replied with conceding silence. Jefferson would still have his uses later, far later.

Shrugging, Jefferson deposited the thread in his ragged coat pocket. His voice was jovial as he grinned. "Oh but come now, Rumpel, you're more than affluent enough to spare a few strands of gold for my silence and for my promise not to dally into any scheme." He laughed lowly and nudged his head to the door. "Of course that's not to say anything about that lovely little vixen that just left. I hope she's fair game, Rumpel. I'd like to-."

At that, the Dark One struck like a viper. Sinister, purple magic erupted from his fingertips in streaks of damson colored lightening. Lashes of power, like thick tentacles, wrapped about the world jumping hatter in a vice grip that was on the cusp of shattering his ribs.

A roar of surprise blurted from Jefferson's mouth as the Dark One slammed him into a towering stalagmite. The large pinnacle cracked at the impact of magic being barreled into its conical side.

A beastly snarl wrench upon Rumpelstiltskin's lips, his eyes burned with smoldering anger like coals. An anger he did not even know he possessed surged through his veins like fire. At the present, he was to enraged to worry of the emotion he felt flare within, or too know that Jefferson was now more suspicious than ever before; only to bash and hurt and… protect.

"You will not go anywhere near that woman. There are thousands of tavern wenches for you to coerce, but I'll have you no where near her!" The Dark One growled lowly, his voice echoing like clapping thunder.

With that he released the magic as nothing more than smoke. The mercenary hatter dropped in a heap to the stone. His eyes never left the mad haberdasher as he scrambled up clutching an arm twisted in an impossible angle.

A wiry claw pointed back to the darkness. "Be gone, Jefferson and if I find you ran your mouth to Regina, useful or not, I will make sure that hat is stuffed down your throat!"

"Of course, Rumpel." He hissed in pain as he staggered back into the darkness. He smiled slightly barely holding back a scream. "Always a pleasure." He bowed as best he could manage without passing out. "Till next time."

Once he was certain the portal maker had departed the fiend cursed luridly at the new inconvenience. Enraged he kicked over the empty cauldron letting it wobble precariously on its side.

He ran a hand through his straggly, matted hair as best he could. A deep breath billowed from his lips as he set a frantic pace. The very last thing he needed was Regina to have caught wind of his presence and even less why he was there.

So far Jefferson had no knowledge of the dagger or his thralldom but a slip could bring utter ruin to his plots. Jefferson was not above taking the dagger if he knew and neither was Regina.

Too the Dark One's vast surprise he realized that was not the biggest concern blaring through his mind. Though he was appalled to even think of Jefferson being told about the dagger, he found himself more alarmed he had at least for a moment set his eyes upon Belle as a new conquest.

Despite himself to remain cool and aloof he had snapped upon the hatter like a rabid dog did a wounded lamb. Why had he rushed to her defense? For sake of the kris to be kept secret or something more…?

~8~8~

"Coffers empty, people without food, serfs running away in the dead of night!" Gaston muttered sullenly as he paced like a caged tiger in the lordly manor of his families ancient lands.

The paltry flames in the grand hearth did little to illuminate the great hall, but what did shine in the glow was ghastly. Heads of animals hung upon the stone walls and taxidermy beasts sat in ever corner reared with their claws bared, forever frozen in a picture of anger and rampage. Normally he loved to be in his favorite room surrounded by his trophies, supping ale and pawing at the servant girls, but today his mood was dampened by the running of his land.

A curse spat past his lips as he repeated the words again. Things were in dire straights on his land and know his old plans lay crumpled at his feet like the last scribe report of his funds.

Since the war, his land was in far more peril than before. Ever since he had taken control by the 'accidental' death of his sire, things were running down and then the wars had decimated what little they had.

He had been about to cut a deal with the ogres to pay them tribute to spare his land and open the doors to the kingdom in return, when Belle's beast had arrived and saved them from ruin.

When he saw that the kingdom had been saved he was stuck with the horrifying duty to marry the daughter of a kingdom decimated by war and bereft of any wealth. But the thing that now called her master was not just a miracle but a beast that could work wondrous powers.

His intent not to wed the intelligent, Belle had been dashed, but also opened a new door to wealth and prestige. With her monster she could do anything! And yet….

Grabbing his foaming tankard, the brute quaffed down a portion of bitter ale. Tossing the mug into the fire an icy grin momentarily snaked upon his lips as the fire roared. And yet, she was foolish. She was kind to it and tender and asked instead of ordered.

In order to put the beast to true work, he needed to convince Belle that what he said was best. Somehow, he had to charm her enough to persuade her into making the creature do wondrous things and then, perhaps her eyes would be open and she could see what they could really do with the beast.

Women were foolish creatures. All it took was a few smiles tossed their way and they crawled and begged to please him. He had witnessed women toss themselves at his feet and promise him their heart for all eternity. Why would Belle be any different?

There was no longer time for him to simply be polite, knowing she was to be his no matter his demeanor. Their marriage had long been arranged and he had never had really tried his best to win her knowing she was already his prize.

Now, he considered, a devious smile tracing his mouth, now it was time to be his most charming and woo the princess into his way of thinking.

Coarse laughter echoed about the hall as he called for another tankard of ale to celebrate his plan. A seductive servant girl he often dallied with entered; her simple eyes dancing with sensuousness.

Smiling lustfully he neared the woman, his hands ready to grab her close. In the coming days he would put his plots into action. Until then Belle could wait while he schemed to charm her and in turn gain control of the Dark One.


	9. Getting to Know You

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals! :3 Also, writers block sucks X(_

**~8~8~**

Wondrous weeks that proclaimed the last hints of blossomed spring drifted gently into summer as mistress and slave worked to restore things of dire necessity the depilated kingdom sorely needed.

Belle never enjoyed ordering her Rum about, but when she did, the commands were never for her benefit alone. He only needed to hear a word from his mistress and entire quarters of the city were mystically cleared of char and ruin and rubble; ready to be built upon once more. With a flicker of his wiry talons the sturdy, gray walls that encircled the city patched themselves and huge boulders that would have taken days with shovels and burden beast to even begin to lift from their craters became nothing more than pebbles children tossed into the sluggish waters.

Healing was offered freely, but a rare few dared asked to be restored by the sinister magic's. Instead of people healed in mass of their ills, gotten by the wars, they carried their burdens to be healed by time in lieu of watching in horror as the lavender hued magic shifted through their bodies. For many, the feared his power more than the slow healing.

The scant few of townsmen and wounded soldiers who fearfully entreated for healing were always grateful of their restored limbs and neatly knit flesh, but their praise rose to Belle alone, the master of Rumpelstiltskin, and never to the monster who worked the craven arts.

On days Belle didn't have him ply his magic's they normally spent short time together in his dim, ominous lair. In weeks, hours passed unbeknownst to the pair as Belle learned of potions and Rumpelstiltskin was granted the novelty luxury of company he had not known since his Bae had been sucked down the portal.

Despite his thoughts of her corruption by the other, greedy nobles who oft glared enviously behind her back in jealousy that she controlled such a powerful prize, his mistress never faltered in her kindness to her slave. A gentle word here, a soft laugh delicately tumbled from her mouth there, never ceased to surprise him.

Very rarely did they eat supper away from one another, and though the Dark One was loathe to admit his pleasure concerning his owner, he did rather enjoy her companionship she offered as they supped. At times, she even seemed amused by how he dined as though he were trying on purpose to disgust her.

Perhaps, he dared fancy in the depths of his black heart all alone in the dead of night when not even the rats scurried to their tasks, she might have seen him as a friend rather than a possession.

Not that she would truly ever think that of her savage slave of course.

~8~8~

"Good evening, Rum." Belle greeted pleasantly as she tramped down the dank stone steps of his lair.

Marching fearlessly into the home of the nefarious Dark One, the beauty smiled widely at her captive. There was no trepidation of the caverns now, Belle noted to herself proudly, as she neared. Tilting her head highly she basked in the vibrant glow of his potions that always seemed to radiate warmth to combat the ever present chill of the dungeons.

The Dark One vapidly halted the slow cycle of the rickety wheel upon hearing the insipid echo of her steps. Her voice coaxed him out of the dour morass that took him thrall, like a light house beacon guiding a ship to safety.

Baelfire oft surrounded his thoughts when lonliness crawled into the cold, black crevices of his heart. When the pain became too much of a burden on his wounded soul he turned to his wheel to balm the pain. The hypnotic spinning, the timeless rhythm all took his mind faraway in the tedium of labor and soothed the tormented memories lashed mercilessly upon his mind.

For centuries upon centuries, his loom had been the only solace, and yet he found himself straying farther away from his spindle as the weeks had passed.

Banishing the melancholic and confusing thoughts, which whirled in his heart, away from his forefront of his mind, he forced Bae out of his contemplations. A dismal, ponderous frown fled from upon his face as he donned his normal, maniacal grin that never once took the beauty aback.

He rose slowly and offered a respectful, flamboyant bow. "Mistress."

Before he could even inquire to her presence she exclaimed happily. "Summers finally here, Rum!" Strolling languidly nearer she peered at him gleefully. "The day is wonderful. The sun is out, the trees are plumed with leaves, and the world is singing the glories of summers return! It's too fine a day to stay sequestered inside."

Wanting to take him outside again; he nearly flinched at her cheerful words. Hiding a frown the Dark One nearly refused or at least asked her to reconsider, but paused. Refusing her did not make progress though he abhorred the thought of being dragged around for all the small children to point and gasp and adults to go fleeing in terror of him.

The more he was out of sight, the more fear he could induce amongst an ignorant people and in turn avoid the annoying habits of mortal who assumed pitchforks and guttering torches were the answer to every problem.

Servants who attended the castle had already given him a nefarious reputation they shared in quaking whispers with the public. Peasants and merhcants alike greedily gobbled down their harrowing tales of horror along with their foul ale and fine wine.

He was rumored to be plying his claws at the blasphemous arts with witches blood and souls of the damned in his fetid dungeons and that he had even threatened to eat a maid raw when she brought him breakfast. Fear of him swirled like a funnel about the kingdom when the sun went down and even when some thought they caught a glance of his gray-gold flesh in the sunlight.

The townsmen were pointedly relived they didn't have to see him just as he was content his mistress did not flaunt him about as some oddity for people to gawk at.

"Come now, Rum." Belle prodded slyly. Her fingers turned his creaking wheel mischievously. "It's been three weeks since you've even poked your head out the door. You can't stay down here forever!" No shadow of fear flickered in her eyes as she stoically faced the monster of magic.

Fighting back a large grin the Dark One bowed his head subserviently. The sight of the beautiful woman staring him down tenaciously, lest he protest, without a hint of anxiousness, nearly made the fiend break out into merry peals of amusement. "Of course I'll join you, Mistress." He replied obediently.

"It'll be only for a little while." Belle confirmed softly, her eyes glinting in satisfaction. "A half an hour is all I ask."

"Very well." Rumpelstiltskin sighed begrudgingly. "The mistress commands and I obey. Would you like we leave the normal way for all to see or shall I do things a little less noticeably?"

Knocking a rebellious chestnut ringlet from her face she smiled once more. "I think a little stealth will be needed. Sarah thinks I'm spending all day in the library and so does Papa."

"As you command." Rumpelstiltskin trilled almost genuinely. She could be infectious with her aura of adventure and trouble, he had to admit privately.

The Dark One snapped his wiry talons, beckoning magic to his call as he half contemplated his mistress. Mulled purple mist that seemingly vomited up from the rock enveloped them both in veils of power. Any other would have been terrified to see their body dispersing into nothingness, but to Belle the sensation was curious as her skin became nothing.

The beauty plunged herself freely into the arms of the magic as it ferried them to their destination through stone and lumber. Not a hint of worry sparked in her mind to whisper of treatchery. Her heart told her no ill would come of his magic's. In a way, though she would not admit it aloud, she trusted her Rum.

In a hearts beat they stood on the outside of the looming, gothic palace in a discreet corner away from peering eyes that would have stared in numb terror if they had noticed the pair coalesce in thin air.

Faintly purple smog drifted into the azure firmament, leaving the pair whole once more in the heat.

All about, the city, once in ruin, bustled with hardy souls striving to finish reconstruction on the shops and houses closest to the citadel. Filthy, lumbering oxen lowed dully as they trudged through cobblestone streets tugging carts filled with lumber and stones and mortar.

Hammers clinked against granite and pounded through nails and timber in a tune all its own. People of all stations and creeds darted busily through the city as though all were on a personal quest to see to their jobs. Laborers sang and joked in the heat, their half naked bodies slick with sweat, as foreman's brusquely barked out orders and gestured at underlings like captains in a battle field.

Sawdust and earthen dust and shavings and the coarse grains from carved stone rose in billowing clouds in one miasma of particles. In some places the blistering sun could nary penetrate the thick mass rising into the sky.

The heat beat down unmericfully upon the world, though if the Dark One was uncomfortable in his leather attire it never showed upon his scaled visage.

Rumpelstiltskin frowned wryly, his tongue clicking in a way that spoke louder than words he was vastly unimpressed. "You wanted me to come out and enjoy this mess?" He dully flourished his talons towards the construction as though it were some badly preformed fair travels play.

As a merchants daughter perhaps she did find the work exciting to see and show their coins were once more flowing freely and that little by little the city was prospering. Yet, the Dark One frowned deeper at another thought. Belle did not seem to be the type to revel in the trade of her kinsmen. In fact, at times he had to ponder did she even wish to be a princess of a merchant king.

"No, no." Belle laughed softly, the notes drifting pleasantly through the air. Even in the raucous hubbub of rebuilding and the thundering of voices all rising as one, the Dark One heard her musical merriment waft above all other noises and wrap around his heart.

Grabbing his leather cuff she tugged him to a shadowed alleyway. "Out this way; past the city walls. I know a place to get out."

"Your father would be in fits if he knew you planed to go past the walls." Rumpelstiltskin observed wryly as he trailed her steps through a labyrinth of narrow alleys that reeked of filth. Only a few stray mutts and mangy, patched cats who whined in terror of the Dark One passed their way; their tails between their legs as they raced to be far from the fiend presence.

Belle led him through a veritable maze until reaching the towering, gray wall that surrounded the city.

One of Rumpelstiltskin's first tasks had been erect the walls, and though they now had the Dark One to watch over their town many still did not trust leaving the safety of the town least those who thought to gain or take advantage of the kingdom lurk in their shade. Maurice did not even trust steeping out beyond the shadow of the gate which begged the unspoken question, what would he say if his precious daughter was sneaking out like some thief?

Coming to an old gatehouse door, that looked as though it had all but been forgotten; the beauty produced a tarnished key from her chemise.

She smiled victoriously as though happy the small portal had not been found. "I've had this key since I was a little girl. I always used it to sneak out when I couldn't take being in the palace another minute." She worked the key in the rusted lock as she continued in hushed tones. "I love my city and my people, but there are times when I desire to be away with the wind and water and grass. The city pales in comparison to the beauty around if you look outside the walls."

All the silks and tassels and plush pillows and satin could not compare to the earth between her toes and the wind upon her cheeks. She longed for the warmth of the sun and abhorred the cool stone of a crowded court. Being out of the palace meant more than just having to leave the pomp as many nobles saw it, but to be free, truly free.

Rusted hinges creaked in protest, but the teeth grating noise was lost in the tumult of industry. A carpet of plush green lay out before them as though beckoning the pair to flee the noisy metropolis.

The wretched, morbid monoliths of war that besieged the kingdom had been hauled from the earth and removed to use as lumber for homes or anything else that could be scavenged from the iron plating.

The snaking fringe of forest land, a good two miles away, looked dark and foreboding in contrast to the sunlit lawn.

"Come on." She nudged her head to the open land and grinned in a way that made the fiends heart jerk.

Nodding obediently, though not without blistering curiosity, the fiend followed at an easy pace. The pair walked in dead silence, the only sound their soft boots crunching upon the lush grass, until coming to the fringe where grass met tangled woodland and melded into dreary coppices bereft of much light. Rare slants of honeyed rays managed to penetrate the thick, dark green canopy above giving an inviting mystic aura to the woods.

Nimble as a young woodland sprite, Belle expertly picked out an old trail she had known all her life. The near invisible track looked little more than a deer path, but she walked the leaf strewn land as though she'd forged the trail.

Distant, Rumpelstiltskin stared uncertainly at his odd owner. Fingers tented ponderously he skirted the edge of the forest as though the trees would rear to life and grapple him.

Who was this woman, this girl of royal blood to be so? Princesses most assuredly did not wander through forests of their own free will, unlike Snow who was an outlaw by treachery.

"What _are_ you doing?" He finally inquired, his face freely showing his abject confusion.

Light and shadow from the leafy roof above dappled the beauty's face as she paused to turn back to her captive. Happiness sparkled like facted sapphire in her eyes as motioned to him gleefully. "I want to show you a place I haven't been since I left for the cottage." Her lips quirked in playful mocking. "Don't tell me the Dark One is wary of the forest?"

"Not at all, Dearie." In an instant he stood beside her calmly, his arms folded. The lingering scent of sickly sweet magic drifted heavily through the air making Belle's nose twitch.

The beauty laughed softly; a sound she almost singularly reserved around everyone else save her Rum. He could bring a smile to her face even without trying. Panicked of the thoughts of Rum that involuntarily swirled in her mind, she staunchly dampened the contemplations of him under the heaviness of repressed concerned thoughts.

Setting of down the trail again, the beauty hummed to shy away anymore thoughts of her captive. What would Sarah say if she knew her thoughts? The path before them was overgrown with straggly weeds and slender saplings as they trudged through. To Belle, she seemed to recognize every strip of bark and tufts of soft moss.

Rumpelstiltskin frowned thoughtfully as he followed through the thin trail. She was indeed a strange, lovely thing. Part of him couldn't help but notice how wild and free she looked dashing under the canopy of stretched limbs. For what seemed like forever to the Dark One, they winded through the cool forest until they appeared quiet suddenly to Rumpelstiltskin in a quiet glade.

The sun slanted through a quaint clearing that sat in the midst of the forest faraway from the bustling city and the industrious folk. Sunlight alit the opening with its golden rays that warmed the lush land not encroached upon by roots and trunks of the surrounding trees. A rivulet of pure, glistening water snaked through the dark forest and seemed to divide the sun drenched clearing down the center. The land was a patch of emerald green, spotted with colorful flora and untouched by the forest blanketed with season old leaves and roots that reared from the ground.

Asphodels mingled with buttercups dipped there heavy crested heads to the lazy brook making its trek to the river. Puffy bumblebees droned indolently from flower to flower, their hum harmoniously melding with the soft rush of water heading down to the river. A welcomed breeze stirred the heat as though playing through the grass and flowers and pregnant boughs about them.

The place looked a serene, bucolic hideaway that enshrouded other with safety and whispered of peace.

"I used to come here when I was a little girl." Belle revealed in a soft, reminiscent smile. Her azure eyes seemed to fog with old memories. None, not even Sarah, knew of her clandestine little world nested in the heart of the forest land.

Here was where she ran for solitude when the world wished her to be someone she was not. Here was where she sat when she yearned for adventure. Here by the lazy stream was where her tears had rippled in the clear waters when her mother passed.

The glade surrounded by the coppices of oaks and maples and pines was sacred to her. And now, though she had not given the meaning thought, she shared such a precious place with him. For once, at the thought of the Dark One standing behind her, she did not try to banish the contemplation of him away.

Quietly, Belle padded to the damp stream bank and knelt. Her reflection shivered in the crystalline, twinkling waters. She laughed faintly to herself as though melding with the babbling brook in peaceful harmony. "This place is special to me. I have so many adventures by this little creek. I never thought them adventures when I was young, but now, I see them for what they were."

"We often see things for what they truly are after the fact, mistress." Rumpelstiltskin supplied lowly. The sound of his palpitating heart resounded in her ears as though for a moment breaking free of the fetid blackness. A small grunt escaped his thin lips as he slid down to rest at the base of a gnarled, bole covered oak rent by lightening. The perfume of summer drifted about them enchanting them with its warm spell.

The beauty nodded somberly in plaintive agreement, her lips compressed into a thin smile. "Some times we don't know what we have even when it's right in front of us."

Shaking her head as though ridding herself of the melancholic thoughts, Belle smiled sincerely and padded back top the Dark One. "So, sir Rumpelstiltskin, this is the one place in my entire realm I enjoy the most; a place I think suits you well when you decide to leave the dark confines of your lair. It makes me wonder, though, where you come from and where you lived once. I've heard so many stories that frankly I don't know which to believe."

"Stories?" He echoed slyly in his tittering trill. "My, what stories have you heard about my hearth and home?"

Belle shruged lazily and leaned against the old oak beside him. "They said your home was in the deepest pits of Hades or in a cave guarded by a cruel dragon and some claimed you had no home but a grave you awoke from every night." Her brow arched inquisitively as she neared him. "So where do you hail from?"

No ripple of compulsion from the dagger tugged at him at the question. For a brief instance the fiend could have dodged the question, but…. Lips thinned into a flat smile the fiend leaned back lazily on the towering oak, his arms crossed. "My home is the Dark Castle." He motioned in the air as though pointing the way. "A place far away in the snowy mountains surrounded by perilous peaks and rocky chasms."

"A castle?" Belle nestled comfortably as she could, thoughtless she was so near to his gray-gold flesh. "Do you have loyal vassals or serfs to tend your land?"

He shook his head, his eyes staring insipidly at the coursing waters. "No. Magic handles everything, Dearie, keeping everything just so."

"Surely you must have at least one servant in your palace." The beauty pressed, unbelieving he could have no one.

"Not a one, Dearie." He cackled impishly, his talons flitting the enthralling summer heat. A hint of perhaps sadness flickered across his voice. Eyes of midnight flashed with a melancholy he swallowed down in the racing hearts beat.

Belle turned away, not certain is he would appreciate the pity wallowing in her orbs. Her fingers toyed with a few drooping blades of grass to avoid eye contact. "That sounds incredibly lonely."

Who would wish to spend their endless centuries alone? Men and women with power normally surrounded themselves with fawning folk. Why did he choose to be alone?

"I wasn't there most of the time." The fiend admitted. His shoulders heaved in a laconic shrug. "Mostly I've wandered the realms striking deals with desperate souls."

"Deals?" Belle perched her head up curiously. Who in their right mind would strike a deal with one such as he? Surely they had to have been, desperate, deplorable souls on the cusp of losing everything.

Rumpelstiltskin scoffed comically. "My reputation of deal maker means nothing to you does it; not here in this realm where I was only a myth meant to frighten naughty children." He snorted amusingly as though preening from his reputation of deviousness. "I've dealt with kings, bargained with queens, bartered with peasants and nobles and anyone else you can think of."

Life had been mostly grand, if not lonely, until the day he became her thrall. He could go anywhere he desired and do almost anything in return for the right price.

"Will you tell me them?" The beauty's eyes brightened, disconcerting the fiend. "About your deals?" She prompted.

He should have said no. He should have diverted the subject, but he found himself smiling at her inquiry. Never once, in his lengthy existence of the Dark One, had people wished to know more of him and just what he could do. No one had ever been curious of his ventures, just what needed to be done and crawl back to whatever foul hole he had scuttled from.

"There was once a couple who a goose and they had made a deal for it to laid golden eggs…." He began uncertainly as his mistress listened with rapt attention.

~8~8~

Afternoon was just ebbing to dip into shadowed evening as Rumpelstiltskin awoke with an itching upon his nose. Colorful, diaphanous wings of a curious dragonfly pumped languidly in his vision as the bug stared at him from the bridge of his nose. With a puff of breath, the fiend shooed the insect from his face before pulling himself into the realm of wakefulness.

Running a hand as best he could through his matted tresses he struggled to recall where he was. The rushing of the stream murmured softly in his ears as though whispering its secrets. Nocturnal bugs and frogs were just beginning their evening symphony giving his soul an ease he hadn't felt in centuries.

For just a moment, the only one in decades, he felt at peace.

A soft smile played upon his lips as he looked down, momentarily forgetting how he had come to such a serence hidaway. His eyes widened almost in terror at the woman before him.

Belle's head rested in his lap as she lay out on the carpet of greenery. Her breathing came in deep slumbering breathes as she dozed the day away. She was comfortable as he had been moments before.

Had the spell of summer really made them fall asleep, he thought in alarm that reared in his chest. Pondering the fiend dove into the annals of his mind. The last thing he recalled was telling her about an old man who wanted fame, and then sleep too had claimed him in the warmth and lullaby of summer. Her head had first been on his scrawny shoulder and now she slept in his lap.

For a moment he fought the urge to leap up and dunk himself in the gushing waters to wash the feel of her away. Her scent wafted through his nose setting his soul aflame. Blood pounded through his ears like war drums and his heat leapt like a frightened doe in his chest. But no, to scramble away would awake her, and though he detested the thought, that was the last thing he wished to do.

Calming himself, the fiend relaxed as best he could, tenaciously attempting to reign in his wildly galloping heart. Staring down upon her, he could not help but bask in her beauty as the flowers did the warmth of the summer. The fleeing sun danced in her silky, umber hair as though being soaked up by her gorgeousness. Tranquility rested upon her pallid face as she slept on his lap.

Oh but she was beautiful.

Softly, his eyes scanned her as though drinking in her beauty would never be enough though he felt the bitter-sweetness of gazing upon her. Beneath her loveliness, his dagger lay somewhere nestled under the folds of her dress, he knew longingly, but if he even thought of making a move for the blade, even if gathering it himself could have been possible, the kris would alert her of his intention and rear to protect her.

He would have to awaken her in a few moments he knew imperatively, but until then….

Slowly, almost at a snails pace, the Dark One lifted a scaled claw to her russet tresses. His light touch stroked her thick mane tenderly as though the slightest hint of pressure would cause discomfort.

His hand shook tremulously to feel even a portion of her. How long had it been since he had touched another? How long had his fingers wished to brush against flesh? Not since he had let go of his son's hand at the portal had he touched another's skin. The moment was painfully mesmerizing to the fiend who drank up the sensation like a parched man would have done the brook. Thrills coursed down his spine as he dared whisper his fingers against her cheek to remove a rebellious tendril of hair from her face.

She hated when her hair got in her face, he knew.

At such a gentle geasture, he couldn't help but notice the quiet, sleepy smile that traced upon her lips as though in a pleasant dream. For a brief instance his dragon like hearing perked to the sound of a soft giggle that tapered from her throat.

Delight and terror surged through the fiend though he knew not why. Perhaps, just to think the smile was reserved for him sent his heart spiraling in his scrawny chest. Abruptly his elation faltered as though dark claws sank their razor nails into his happiness and dragged it down into a murky morass.

He spat an inward curse at himself at his soft foolishness that should have died with the old Rumpelstiltskin. What nonsense did he dare to fancy? That her smile was actually for him? That she would think he was anything to feel comfortable or happy around, monster that he was? No, she could not be some how thinking of him.

For a few hours he had become careless and now his mind was wandering like a fool!

In an instant the carapace of coldness and cunning enshrouded him. Foolishness had no place in his mind, only the plan to free himself. A hateful frown tugged at his lips as he scolded himself roundly for his stupidity. His mistress was probably dreaming of Gaston or happier times, never her beastly slave.

"Mistress." He poked her gently in the shoulder, his mind determined to bash the tender thoughts that pressed at him away from the darkness of his heart.

Belle's eyes fluttered sleepily as she shifted in her repose. For a moment she seemed confused before she realized where she was. A smile nearly stretched upon the fiends lips as she bolted upright. Her surprise almost made him forget his troubling contemplations.

Scrambling aright she dusted her blue dress free of leaves and flecks of dirt. "How long…?" She stared up at the sky, her eyes narrowed as she tried to gauge the time.

"A few hours." Rumpelstiltskin remarked bored as though he hadn't been asleep at all. "I couldn't leave you here, Mistress. I was not given leave to depart."

Guilt sparked in her eyes. "I'm sorry." She blinked as though shaking off the remnants of her dream. "Can you bring us to the palace?"

"Of course." He bowed lowly just as purple magic began to coil about them.

Inwardly, the Dark One praised her insistence of ready departure away from the tranquil glade and confusion, terrifying thoughts. The sooner he was away and back in his lair to scheme, the sooner he could be free thinking of her and work on his machinations he'd toiled for so long.

~8~8~

Belle wandered the torch lit halls at a languorous pace as she contemplated her thoughts. With each slow step, another recalled dreams by the creek cascaded in her mind. The dreams were not terrifying in their nature, but to whom they concerned gave her pause. Rum flashed through her mind with every moment of slumber.

She had dreamt of him in his Dark Castle, as he termed it, at his wheel or combing over his hoarded trinkets he had told of. They had not been nightmares, but dreams she wished not to awaken from.

Why had she dreamt of him, she pondered as entered her chamber. And why had she found them so enjoyable instead of petrifying?

Humming lightly, Belle smiled at the thought of him whirling in her head. Once she had imagined him standing in the library tenderly stroking her cheek. She hadn't felt an inkling of revulsion of even surprise as his hands smoothed over her skin. It had felt wonderful and made her belly twirl. She had stood there wishing for him to do something, anything and now she could only supply her vast imagination of thoughts of him.

"You seem to be in a good mood missus, if I do say so myself." Sarah chuckle primly as the beauty appeared in her chamber. The maid folded another chemise as she smile at her ward.

Though she had nearly gone searching for the princess hours ago, she had left the girl in her books to dally the day of way with her romances and adventure tomes and the surprise the messenger had left her.

She winked cheekily at the dreamy, humming Belle. "You must have read Gaston's letter he sent the way you seem to be floating about with your head in the clouds. The messenger was told instructions to put it directly in your library." She seemed to giggle like a young lass. "Gaston's so thoughtful of you, Missus. "

Belle blinked as though shaking off an enchantment, her wandering mind brought down low by the words of her guardian. Gaston had sent her a letter? If he had certainly it had to been in deplorable pen with barely legible words.

Shaking away the thoughts that plagued her mind, she smiled uncertainly. "Gaston, yes…of course. I think I'll go read it again…."

Sara tossed her head and smile surreptitiously as her ward departed back to her coveted library.

"I knew she'd fall for that nice boy's charms sooner or later. These things are fate." She chuckled pleasantly to herself. In all her long years in the palace, around nobles and courtiers she had been privy to their emotions and escapades of love. The way Belle had entered, humming and thoughtful and had given her away to the observant maid.

Yes, Sarah Potts knew true love upon a woman's face when she saw it.


	10. The Yearning Heart

A frustrating snarl of fury wrenched past Rumpelstiltskin's thin, gray lips as he angrily paced the confines of his sinister lair like a trapped dragon. His stomping footsteps resounded sonorously about the razor, fang-like pinnacles in the caverns, beating a furious tattoo that reverberated his simmering rage along the frigid walls and softly wailing drafts.

The ominous nature of the dungeon seemed not as half as perilous as the lord of the cavern who bristled dangerously. Not even a rabid wolf looked as deadly as he in the dank light shading his odd flesh with light and shadow and ominous cries of his home.

Pungent regents, laid perfectly upon his rock work slab, sat forgotten and untouched where they lay. Even his precious, wooden wheel ready to be harnessed and used upon a fresh heap of golden hued straw lay disregarded and abandoned by his ancient mind and spell clever talons that worked the creaking loom.

Nothing, not even the balm to his troubles, could keep his thoughts on his machinations!

Four days had passed since he'd fallen into serene slumber by his endearing mistress and allowed the peace of her glade to soften the impenetrable ice of his heart. Four long, arduous days had trekked through time and he'd been able to accomplish nothing!

Combing his wiry talons through his matted, straggly tresses, the fiend mumbled a low, seething curse past his compressed mouth. His voided orbs darted about crazily in his panic as though the answer to his problems could be found in the fetid darkness surronding him. A growl of rage rumbled from his throat about the caverns like the warning of a dangerous, trapped animal.

How it was possible that in all his long years as the master of magic he had never been distracted so? Could one strange slip of a woman take his thoughts so easily?

The image of his owner clung like a limpet, banishing all other thoughts save herself. Work eluded him, plots dodged his cunning, and even his wheel was no aid to be rid of her lurking about his mid. He could think of nothing save his owner!

When he plucked up a vial he saw her lovely face in the refracting glass and in the depths of his simmering, colorful potions. The bubbling cauldrons acrid brews smelled of her tantalizing fragrance of spring, instead of the noxious stench they normally wafted, and filled his nostrils with hints her perfume. As he spun the flaxen stalks into glimmering gold he could not help but hearken to her lovely voice in place of the squeak of the wheel.

Even in sleep he found no solace, for she danced in the fog of dreams and plundered his mind of all other scenes that roam a sleeping soul. Night upon night he tossed and turned restlessly on the soft pelts he claimed as his bed; his body caught and entangled under their warmth that he wished to be hers.

His ugly scaled flesh, so horrendous when compared her dainty flesh, felt her close as though he had to but reach out and he would feel her porcelain skin beneath his claws. At times he bolted awake from restless repose, drenched with tears of sweat, his chest heaving like forge bellows hard at work, thinking her head was still on his lap as they rested by the creek. But each night, the touch was merely dreaming pushed too far and never enough to satisfy.

Oh too feel her again! His claws twitched eagerly even at the thought.

Though he feasted with her every night, the fine suppers were only temporary meals to sate his growing appetites and always left him starving for more once she hauled the silver tray upon the steps and shut out the light she brought in with her smiles and laughs that banished the darkness of his home far away into the cracks and crevices.

As the last morsel was eaten and the last ounce of tea drained from their cups, he felt a melancholy, not of his making, crawl over him as the fog rolled over the land and the darkness slunk back into its rightful place.

It was when she bid him goodnight he felt more ravenous than before.

He hungered for his mistress more than the tea and hot, scrumptious meals she always laid out daintily before them. He craved her as the red eyed drunks did their precious mead and the mercenaries did a good brawl.

At times, he felt as though if he didn't see her he would cease to breathe! And though he was loathe to even consider the thought, at times he had to ponder did she urge for the same companionship that clawed away at his soul.

Her presence was merely an instance to engorge himself before she went away leaving him hungrier than ever before. Somehow she had crawled under his skin and swam through his black blood and he could do nothing but find temporary relief when she was near.

"You fool; this chit of a woman has somehow ensorcelled you!" Rumpelstiltskin raged with a feral growl. "Better poison should have gotten in my blood than her." He snapped at himself aloud, his jagged teeth flashing in the pathetic torch light guttering insipidly against the consuming darkness. His surly echo thundered perniciously through the fanged catacombs as though mocking his agitation.

A muscle in his jaw twitched as he sought to reign control of his rioting emotions; emotions that hadn't arisen in his soul since his Bae had fallen down the portal and he was truly alone.

Growling furiously he forced himself to admit in the depths of his soul perhaps he had grown a trifle fondness for her though not of his own doing. Belle showed him unwarranted kindness where all else tossed him disgust and hatred that deflected upon his icy soul.

He was cruel and ruthless and remorseless to all that sought him ill and did ill unto him, but that was for those who abhorred him, not for those one who deemed to show him a speck of tenderness.

Even an ill tempered dog would befriend a soul that fed them scraps, he reasoned with a frigid logic and a colder heart. Was her gentleness truly any different? His mistress tossed him succulent scraps of tenderness his aged, lonely, starving soul could not help but savor, and he, like a scrawny, starving dog, could only voraciously scarf them down and beg for more.

Could he truly be blamed if he had become somewhat fattened to her utter Belle-like charms?

Screwing his eyes shut as her lovely features dashed across his minds eye, he sought to banish her name from his mind as though it were a dark curse. Breath hitch tightly in his throat even at the mention of her wonderful name. Black blood galloped heatedly through his veins in a desire to but whisper her name upon the frigid winds through barely parted lips.

Despite what the darkness inside him screamed and roared and raved to curse her name and fight even harder to gain emancipation, he needed to be close to her. Every inkling of his body yearned to be near his mistress, for her to assuage the burning that only she could quell and he to savor being close to his owner.

Ever since becoming the nefarious Dark One, he denied himself little in the ways to sate his fancies. So long had other people cruelly taken from him and he had been bereft of even the basic of luxuries as a simple spinner he abhorred to shy away from any interest he craved.

Anything he possibly desired was his at a snap of his wiry talons, bringing forth what he wished in a sickly miasma of dark purple mist. Wanting with all his soul to be near her was an urge too great to combat, and one he knew he could not act upon as readily as he was wont.

Even in the perilous standing of things a thin smile perked upon his lips at the delectable irony before falling away once more into a querulous frown. Had it not been his own sordid irony displayed before him he would have laughed heartily and basked in the pain of another wretched soul who found himself hungering for even a kind word.

How to grasp what he desired was the complex question, he noted as he tossed the irony from his mind like refuse. His pace slowed into a dull, ponderous rhythm as he tapped his skinny fingers thoughtfully along his chin.

Surely she would grow suspicious if he asked her to spend longer time with him in his dungeon; not that she would willingly agree to spend more time with her slave even if he did supplicate to his owener for a such a thing. If he suddenly began to waltz outside for the entire ignorant rabble to run screaming in terror, that too would rear alarms in her mind and wondering what schemes he was weaving in his ancient mind.

Shaking his head, Rumpelstiltskin fought back another curse and a frustrated sigh ready to tumble from his mouth. A growl rumbled deeply in his throat as he leaned sulkily against a massive stalagmite like a grumpy child. His boot scuffed coarse pebbles and grit petulantly as he fought to dampen the surge of reviving emotions. Pinched fingers massaged the slope of his nose in barely suppressed agitation.

Where could he be that she would be near? Sarah would sooner burn down her mistress' quarters than allow him entry; not that he wished to be there, the fiend reminded himself hastily. Even the thought of being in the same room she slept in prodded beads of sweat to break across his flesh and his mouth to dry like the sun scorched earth.

Abruptly, the revelation struck him like a lash of lightening broken upon a summer's sky. Jolting straight the fiend snapped his wiry claws as though he had discovered a new elixir from his experiments.

The library! He nearly roared the words in victory. Of course the library would be the perfect place to quell the fever she induced in him and perhaps soothe his troublesome thoughts enough for him to think properly.

No other save Belle and the occasional servant tread the kempt, tome filled chamber. The beauty absolutely adored the worn, leather backed books and the cozy room allotted for the palace literature his owner loved like a second home.

To be there with her would be private and most certainly begin to alleviate the raging inferno blazing only for her so he could think clearly once more and not have her suspicions arise to alarmingly at his sudden presence.

A thin smile snaked upon his features as he beckoned magic to his call. Dark power of the foulest nature burned through his veins as the latent magic roiled under his scaled flesh in a burning surge that heeded his will.

Eyed closed, Rumpelstiltskin focused on the quaint library as he wove the magic as he did the straw upon his wheel. A smile twitched upon his intangible features as the fiend felt himself grow as light as air as he wafted away to hopefully see his mistress and the balm his mind.

~8~8~

Scorching noonday sun blazed happily upon the bustling courtyard of king Maurice. Nary a wisp cloud scudded in the azure firmament deliver a scant instance of shade behind its white vapors. The heated air was breezeless and thick with the scents only summer brought along with its season.

Drums thundered happily in the blistering sun about the reconstructed courtyard of the palace. Pipes fluted in merry trills and lutes were delicately plucked by minstrel's clever fingers in glorious melody that prompted dancing by the younger adults and children even in the uncomfortable air.

Tasseled, silken pennants of sky blue, touting the king's royal crest and embroidered intricately with gold thread, fluttered limply in the breezeless, heated air. Banners hung gaily upon the gates and the precipices of the castle roof, hanging insipidly as though begging for a zephyr to stir them.

Men and women of all creeds and ranks donned in their finest clothing milled about the spotless courtyard flagstones waving kerchiefs and scraps of cloth energetically even in the blistering heat that beat upon their heads.

A festive air impregnated the masses that had arrived from destroyed villages and wounded fiefdoms to celebrate and feast the day victory from the clutches ogre's grips was assured.

Laughter floated upon the music filled air as people jubilantly lost themselves in the celebration. Cool wine and ale and punch flowed freely from the kings store and the rebuilt taverns. Long benches of mouthwatering food were laid out for people to take their fill after the ceremony was ended and already men with too much mead in their bellies were trying to accomplish games they would never have dared try a hand fully sober for the fun of it all.

Children dashed gleefully about legs of their elders, happily reveling in the joyous day. No longer were they warned to play or stray far from their homes lest the savage ogres capture one and stuff them in a pie, or so the warnings were doled out by equally as frightened parents.

Gladness and prosperity welled in the hearts of those who had given and fought so much. Finally they could rejoice in their freedom and strive for the peace they had so long lived their lives. No longer did they have to cast wary glances at the tent and smoke strewn horizon and wonder would a new day bring them death and slavery. Now they could be the rich kingdom again without worries or ills of marauding foes seeking them harm.

Smiles crowned the faces of all with the facts that their lives were once more unhindered by the ogres grotesque shadow; all save one.

"You could at least smile, Belle." Maurice whispered clandestinely, through a large smile, to his daughter as he waved a plump, bejeweled hand to his people in noblest greeting. His other hand hoisted a large ornate fan, gilded with painted ships, he pumped lethargically to cool his dripping face.

Pearls of sticky sweat brooked down his grayed temples and dampened his mauve tunic collar with dark stains. "I know you must be disappointed Gaston could not make the celebration, but worry not, he'll arrive in a few days time." He soothed obliviously.

His daughter's melancholy could only stem from not being near her betrothed, he assumed ignorantly, as all who interacted with her had as well. Maids sighed wistfully and deemed it royal love when she hummed to herself and stared out into nothingness with a dreamy air and dubbed her sadness the workings of a torn heart when she was silent with a peculiar gloom that non could comprehend.

Anger rose hotter than the wavering heat lines from the cobblestone roads as Belle bit back an ignoble retort to her beloved Papa. Gaston was not why she found herself so aloof from the smiles and cheers and menagerie of banners swaying in the heat.

Perhaps if her conscious had not been gnawing away at her soul so steadily until her guilt had bored a whole into the epicenter of her very being, she would have smiled and laughed like the rest simply because he was not present with his booming laughter and boorish jests.

Instead, she could not even bolster that to afford her people a weak grin. Injustice burned fiercely in her spirit, hotter than a winter's bonfire heaped with dry straw. While the townsmen cheered their nobles and lords, they all put the man who had saved them in the back of their minds like an unpleasant thought.

It wasn't right to him.

A thin, cotton dress in her favorite shade of blue gowned her form as she went through the motions of greeting and thanking others like any witless noble could do. Her neck was adorned with the only piece of jewelry she chose; a pearl drop opal dangling upon a fine golden chain. Once upon a time it had been her mothers, and now she displayed the fine but simple craftsmen ship at every occasion just as her mother would have done. Her wild umber hair cascaded past her squared shoulders giving her a more regal look than normal.

"All hail, Lady Belle, the hero in our direst hour!" A guard roared out from somewhere in the crowd to break up drunken brawls and spot cutpurses. A raised spear tip that glinted in the sun was the only indication of the man in the host of people.

The crowd roused a roaring cheer that disturbed curious birds from their iron perches on the gates and the gargoyle precipices from the castle roof.

"Belle!" Her name swept in a thunderous cry that became only an indiscernible force of human voices rising as one.

Maurice beamed proudly at his less than pleased daughter who flinched at the cries as though they were tossed stones. Head held high he basked as her name deafened them. "Say something to them." He nudged her with his shoulder to prod her forward.

"What?" She glanced at her papa uncertainly, taken aback. "What will I say?"

"Whatever your heart tells you to, daughter." He retorted, his corpulent hands engulfing her own. Nudging his graying head to the quieting crowd he smiled tiredly. "I'm sure you can find the appropriate words."

Turning back to the serfs and peasants and vassals that crowded the palace courtyard, the beauty managed a tremulous grin. Anxiousness churned in her gut violently as she cleared her throat for time to dredge up anything to speak. The small noise sounded abhorrently loud in the silence of an awaiting crowd.

Almost instinctively as though feeling two eyes upon her, though she was being stared by hundreds, she spared a furtive glance up to the gothic citadel.

Looking down from the large, spider worked glass stared the Dark One.

Somberness and intrigue hinted across his gray-gold scales as he peered curiously down upon her, observing her like a hawk did an oblivious field mouse to devour.

Settling her gaze back to the eager crowd, the words that eluded her so, gushed forth like a wellspring flooded by summer rains. "For nearly a year our kingdom was beset by foul ogres." She began lowly, her voice rising slow but evenly in the dry, windless air. "Today we celebrate our survival and the ongoing renewal of our homes and lives and family. Today we celebrate the courage of our warriors and the people who did not run, but stood to protect their homes with knives and pitch forks and wood cutters axes."

Cheers that seemed to shake the very foundation and mortar of the ancient castle resounded about her as she paused to quell the nervousness twirling in her belly.

Taking a step forward she pressed on. "But today is not ours alone. Today we celebrate a man who saved us from the very grasp of slavery and doom. The same man who vanquished the threat of barbaric ogres stomping our home into the earth!" Belle proclaimed proudly, pride gathering in her heart. "The man who saved us all deserves our thanks, Rumpelstiltskin."

A hushed murmur shifted through the crowd uneasily at the name. Eyes darted about warily as though the fiend was lurking about ready to appear in the midst of good folk in all his devious glory.

Guards clamped gauntleted hands about their swords and worrisome parents grabbed for their children, clutching them tight to their legs to see them safe. A few rumors had been whispered the Dark One stole wayward children to skin them for pelts.

The beauty spared a surreptitious glance at her father to gauge his reaction. Crimson mottled his corpulent face as he still stood tall. Displeasure danced behind his gray orbs as he tenaciously kept his lips upturned in a foolish, corpulent smile that all but belayed his shock his daughter would speak such words on this day of days.

She would hear of her little speech later in his study, of that there was no doubt.

Stepping away vapidly, the beauty hid a true grin from her father as he waddled forward. His drenched face twisted ponderously as though rapidly working in his mind how to veer off the unpleasant subject of the Dark One. A loud laugh escaped his thick lips as he jocularly did his best to banish the name they all abhorred.

Eager to put such thoughts behind them on the glorious feast day, the crowd took her words as nothing more than a morbid, unfunny joke.

Unnoticed and perhaps unwelcome now that she had spoken her heart, Belle slipped out of sight from the ignorant townsmen and the eyes of her disapproving father. The shadow of the towering palace hid her slender frames as she skirted along the cool stone walls back into the heart of the palace where her soul tugged fiercely to be away in her library.

For four days she had felt the compulsion of her heart to be wherever her Rum dwelled. Though she did not find it good form to linger unwelcome in his lair, for him to be in the one place in the stronghold she could scarcely pull herself away was a temptation she could not resist.

~8~8~

Rumpelstiltskin stared down at the festive affair darkly as his voided onyx eyes scanned the joyous crowd. The townsmen all flying kerchiefs and gaily decorated torn segments of cloth dyed in the standard colors looked akin to some dizzying patchwork quilt to his hawk like vision.

A scowl wrenched his features as he peered hatefully down at the populace who hated him with just as much zeal that festered in his black heart for mortals. How could he have forgotten their festival was held that day?

Just another thing that had slipped his mind in the past four days, he noted somberly. He cursed himself as a weak minded fool at the thought for having anything slip his ancient mind.

Weeks ago he had nearly begged his mistress not to make him attended the pitiful little gathering and she had conceded, albeit dourly, for she wanted him to receive the thanks due him. Now, he almost wished he had agreed if only to be nearer to her instead of staring from afar like a longing serf to a noble bred woman.

Turning away disgusted from the pane, the fiend strove to put his mind on something, anything, else.

Grumpily, he took his leisure surveying the quaint library. He'd been their only once, briefly, when they had first arrived at the palace, but not since then. The room was neatly packed with old tomes sequestered into every nook and cranny they could be maneuvered. A worn feel of forgotten age lingered in the paper scented chamber making her think of his odd mistress.

He should have been, and most certainly others of her caliber and station, surprised this was a princess's favorite place in the entire palace and not some court or parlor bedecked with ornate fashions and silks and satins, but he wasn't astounded at all; not when that princess was Belle. Lovely, beautiful, gorgeous Belle.

Not much had changed since he had been away from the tome filled chamber as he recalled from his mind. The only difference was a new array of thick books stacked haphazardly next to a faded blue chaise where she spent her leisure time lost in other worlds.

A smile twitched upon his thin lips as he imagined his mistress lying there, absorbed in a tome as the hours passed. In his minds eyes he pictured her scanning the yellowed pages intently, eyes greedily feasting upon the thin black scribbles, her hair at times hampering her vision that she blew out of her eyesight with a puff of breath. For a moment the image seemed so real he felt at any moment she would materialize from the sun warmed air in that exact spot.

Tossing his head violently, the Dark One cursed vilely, trying to banish the image from his mind.

Fisting his eyes, the fiend sought to control himself from erupting in a cry of abject fruition. His body quaked as he fought to be rid of her in his mind like some horrid memory that refused to leave him be. He fell into the trap so easily; he hadn't known he was thinking about her again till he found he was grinning into space like a dull witted peasant.

A scolding murmur flew past his lips in a malicious growl. Enraged, the fiend kicked at a towering stack of books, taking what little satisfaction he could in the destruction. Tomes scatted haphazardly upon the worn, carpeted floor revealing a small folded sheet of paper tucked near the bottom of the stack.

A broken seal forged by a signet of buck antlers adorned with a gross amount of points lay half stuck by the heat to the faded parchment. The red wax had melted slightly from the summers inferno, making the wax run and free the contents of the note.

Curious, the Dark One plucked up the small letter. Without much thought, the fiend hastily flicked the epistle open. His eyes scanned the poorly scrawled letters lazily but with a trifle intrigue. A repugnant odor that wafted from the note made his nose twitch as he read the near impossible to decipher script.

Ink blots splashed liberally along the faded vellum and streaks from an old goose quill made the letters almost seem written in some strange ancient tongue reserved for spells.

_Dearest Belle, _

_It grieves me that I cannot be there to attend the celebration of our victory. I know how you love to listen to my heroic tales of slaughtering ogres by the scores. Rest assured, I shall return soon. Hopefully, you have put that beast of yours to good, honest work and made our kingdom flourish so we may prepare the day for our wedding. I know you look forward to seeing me again. _

_-Gaston_

Rage burned like twin furnaces in the Dark One's voided black eyes as he reread the epistle.

How could such a self-centered lout be afforded to wed his mistress?

By the looks of her whenever the name Gaston was brought up, she had no real love for the brute. Dread paled her flawless face at the off handed mention of marriage by her maids and she refused to speak of matrimony when down in his lair.

A curse spewed past his lips as he tore the stained parchment asunder in his pernicious wrath. Shreds of yellowed paper danced through the air before falling like fresh flakes of snow to the floor.

For a brief instance, he felt a possessive ferocity he had never known fall over him like a shroud wrapped tightly about his soul. Had Gaston been there he would have done anything to make his life miserable, even should it cost him pain!

Jealously. The word darted in a panic in Rumpelstiltskin mind. Anger shriveled into a cold dead husk as he realized the rabid frenzy that had gripped him in its icy claws. Had the note made him…jealous? Jealous that Gaston could pen such mean little notes and see her at a whim while he had to plot even to spare a glance?

"It's not jealously!" He snarled lowly to himself to subdue the panic arising within at the emotion he had never felt till that moment. "This witch, this enchantress in innocent maidens flesh has done something to me! There has to be a reason I feel so."

Perhaps it was the ill effects of a potion gone wrong, or mayhap the dagger was reacting being so long in ones grasp. It couldn't be jealously, he denied tenaciously with every ounce of calloused logic he could dredge. He did not become jealous!

Cursing himself a simple fool, the fiend commanded magic to his call to take him back down into his lair. Coming here without her was a mistake, he knew now, and had only increased his fervency and the thoughts he could not erase.

Wisps of lavender magic slithered upwards from the stone as he prepared to depart and try stoically to wipe his mistress from his mind. Maybe there was a potion he had missed that would alleviate her presence and make forget him. Maybe a night deep in a keg of mead would chase her away from his thoughts.

Abruptly, a voice, _her _voice, sang in his ears in the sweetest of sounds. "Today we celebrate our survival and the ongoing renewal of our homes and lives and family…."

Magic he had been prepared to summon drifted away in thin tendrils of lilac hued smoke akin to a cold hearth fire.

Lured to the monolithic window, the fiend crept back to view the woman his mind could not dismiss. Her words were eloquent in their simplicity and though he was not even part of her pitiful little kingdom he felt pride well in him.

Golden rays that drenched the celebration turned her thick mane into a crimson, burnished amber. Her body was graceful and wonderful and he found himself unable to tear his onyx orbs away from her loveliness. To know he had once been so close to her sent thrills racing up his spine.

A smile wide stretched to the point of pain upon his impish features as she spoke his name. His heart lurched for her and he felt to the point of cheering. Of course she would think of him; not satisfied to let other dismiss him and forget he existed.

A soft smile traced his lips as he lead his forehead upon the warm pane. Whimsically, his lack talons tenderly traced her outline upon the transparent aperture as he lost himself in her words.

He did not simply crave her, Rumpelstiltskin realized suddenly. The incredible thought hit him with like a dagger stabbed into his back. Perhaps a blade struck in his body would have been less of a surprise, he reckoned with what little sense had not reeled at the sudden brilliance.

Shocked, the fiend staggered away from the window as though the glass were constructed of poison. His wiry talons sunk into the stitched fabric of a comfy looking high back chair for support. It was all he could do not to fall to his knees with the discovery.

He did not simply hunger for her company and her laugh, he knew with an utmost clarity. There was something he had not considered, something he had not thought possible to him of such power and age.

Lust.

He lusted for her more than any woman he had desired as his measly, cowardly self. He lusted for her more than he had ever done that harlot Milah.

Lust, that had to be the reason why he could not stop thinking of her. She was gorgeous, and it had been literal centuries since he had been with another. He wanted her, he realized with a longing that saying through his blood. And she was out of his reach.

"I am the Dark One, nothing should be denied me; not even the flesh of my mistress!" He hissed loathsomely in a murmur. The fiend set a pace like a rabid caged tiger, his mind awhirl with what he knew he should not have.

How long had it been since he had held a woman close in his arms and sated his passion? How long had he been without the comforts of a female nestled in his arms? Was lust truly the only temptation that kept her upon his mind?

"Rum." Belle spoke his name tenderly as she appeared quietly in the library. She moved upon shadows feet as she crept into her sanctuary in the castle.

Instantly his thoughts snapped away from wanting her. Ruby surged heatedly through his face as it had not done in ages at the revelation he had come to only moment before. For once he was glad of the gray-gold scales that hid his blush. Had she come seconds sooner he would have heard his words.

Bowing his head subserviently, his hair a straggly curtain of dirty brown, he clasped his hand together to keep them from their tremulous quiver. "Mistress, how may I serve?"

"I saw you, from the window." The beauty explained sheepishly as though searching for a suitable excuse. Her eyes flickered away bashfully, fearful he would read the feelings that danced behind her cobalt orbs. Rubbing her arm embarrassedly, she busied herself by reading the titles lined upon the shelves. "I thought it was unfair how they do not accredit you with victory."

He trilled carelessly, hoping to mask the emotions that had laid dormant his black soul for centuries. "'tis no matter. I only did what my mistress commanded. I hear and obey."

"No but it does matter." She rebuffed with a sudden gentle zealousness. She laid a hand tenderly on his wrist though did not seem to register her touch. Long lashes hooded her eyes making her orbs unreadable as he stared down breathlessly at his owner. "To me it matters." Ended her quiet reply to deny his nonchalant words.

Breath hitched in his chest in a constricting vice, unable to even draw in the musty, paper scented air. Even at the small, simple touch her soft hand was a clamp against his heart, burning into his flesh and into his soul.

A peculiar sound flitted involuntarily from his throat at her touch. Unable to halt the desire of his flesh now glorious reality after four long days, his eyes closed dreamily as he dictated the touch to memory. So long thinking of her, dreaming of her, he now engorged himself upon the feel of her clever fingers along his scales. How he wished to feel her delicate hands over his arms and chest and feel her warmth suffusing with his own.

How he wished that it could be.

"You…you like this, don't you?" She quirked her head coquettishly, peering at him inquisitively as though unearthing a new discovery from her Rum. Inside her soul crowed at the reaction her fingers enacted upon him. Perhaps, he felt an inkling of what yearned in her soul as well.

Abruptly, she lifted a hand to his cheek. Her sun warmed palm rested against the heat of his gray-gold scales without a hint of revulsion.

Forcing himself not to nod, not to give away a hint of his enjoyment he breathed in a sharp gasp. "Mistress…." For a moment he could have poured his desire out to her in an endless fount of praise. He could have exclaimed the thoughts that had remorselessly plagued him for nigh four nights. And yet….

"Yes?" Her voice was little more than a stilled whisper. Blood hammered in her ears, deafening her to all save his odd timbre. The castle could have been engulfed in flames and her eyes would have only been for him

"Mistress, I must depart for a time." He managed in a hollow stammer choked from his tight throat. Taking a step away from her addicting touch, he forced his pounding heart to stay its riotous beat. "I know you are less that eager to take me off my lease, but I have things I must see to in different realms. I ask for a leave of no longer than three days."

Belle blinked in surprise forcing the thoughts of him away. "Oh…" She cursed herself inwardly at her fool heart.

Forcing herself to seem normal, a trial she found harder to act with him so near, she arched a brow curiously. Laughter and smiles came so readily when he was present that many a time it was not at all seemly. A desire simply to be in the same room with him sparked joy she wished would never end in her heart.

The beauty nodded primly smoothing out her thin, cotton dress. "Of course you may go. So long as you promise not to plot or scheme to claim your dagger, you have my leave to go. I think the time has come I offer you more freedom and trust. So far you've done nothing to make me wary of you."

Gratefulness rushed into his wiry frame at her approval. "You have my word I shall do nothing, or seek out any to obtain my dagger." He bowed deeply, reverent.

Coward, he snarled inwardly at himself. He was the soul wielder of ultimate power, and still he held the heart of a cowardly spinner deep in his chest like a timid cripple he was ages before. He could not even admit he enjoyed her touch without his fear gripping him with its icy talons and thickening his tongue with frost.

To get away from her was best, the fiend reckoned, if he could not be near without his head swimming. Away from his kind owner, then most certainly, hopefully, he could shove her out of his thoughts and cool the fever of lust that burned through him like a brand claiming his desires upon his soul.

Perhaps far from her lovely face and warm smile and kindly laughter he could begin to think properly once more.

Perhaps.


	11. The Return of Two

_A/N: Thanks for reading and all the lovely reviews guys and gals! :3 I'm delighted you like the story so far._

**~8~8~**

Three days. The words rang blissfully in Rumpelstiltskin's cunning mind as he peered at the sun misted outline of his mistresses kingdom long miles away from his reach.

Wind, cool and happily welcomed in the blistering haze of day, lazyily swayed his tattered burgundy cloak and rustled the light green tall grass that came up to his thighs. Dirty, gray-golden flesh glittered in the oblique rays transmuting his scales into a menagerie of hues. Gritty dust from the brown, cracked roads clung to his straggly hair and silver buckled boots.

Belle would make him bathe, he knew imperatively. A smile mounted upon his scaled features at the thought. She liked him better clean though he was still no fan of the constant lye soap and warm water.

Banishing the peculiar thought of bathing away from the forefront of his thoughts, the fiend sobered and enjoyed the flitting kiss of a breeze tapering across his rough skin. Never before had he really noticed the world about him, but for three days he'd taken to once more enjoying simple things as his mistress enjoyed them.

Relaxed, he stood under the forest green plumage of a singular sprawling, bole covered maple atop a knoll raised above an abundant field bursting with fledgling green stalks of wheat. The land below him was a neat blanket of fallowed and planted and growing earth as though testifying to the kingdoms tenacity to over come peril so quickly. Already crops were beginning to grow towards the sky and the smell of prosperity once more in the nostrils of the peaceful realm.

Breathing deeply, the fiend delicately savored the last precious hours of freedom before his promise to be back to his mistress was ended.

Three days had passed and now he was due back to his owner as he had promised. In the past hours he'd toiled relentlessly with his carefully crafted plans, plucking and weaving and spinning the fates of others who knew not of one another, as a dedicated spider did its grand homes of silks to trap unheeding fly's.

Of course he had acted normally, always so nonchalant and chuckling and in control while he dealt and bartered with kings and peasants. Others in realms leagues away were neck dip in the morass of their own problems, not even surmising his will was no longer his own and he called another master.

The king's sons had died at the hands of a powerful man he assumed slain in a demonstration to prove his battle prowess and now the grieving monarch needed the replacement in order to secure gold for his kingdoms depleted coffers and wed the cursed Midas' daughter to unite the kingdoms.

All it had taken was a few trips to a castle and a hovel with an old widow and her sheepherder son and a part of his major plans had been set in motion! Soon the entire avalanche of his own design would begin to rumble from the mountain of fate, and once begun it would not stop.

Satisfied pride welled within the fiend as he chuckled lowly to himself. After a few more years nothing would be as it once was and his journey to right wrongs could begin. After centuries of scheming and planning and waiting for the opportune moment to arise for his plans to be put into place, what were a few flitting years to his ageless form?

Of course, his scheming, while expertly dealt, had not halted him from thinking of his kind owner. Despite the destinies he wove together with an expert skill, somewhere, even as a flitting whisper in his head, Belle listed wonderfully through his ancient mind as an echo that never ceased to remind him of her.

Whenever he closed his eyes even for a brief moment, he saw he face. Wherever he chose to ramble about the realms her words would saunter through his mind like the magic that ferried him hither and thither. Instead of the feelings of desire being squashed and cast away as putrid garbage, his fondness for her had only grown like ivy coiling its stem about his stone heart. Her hand left an invisible brand upon his cheek that never cooled its heated fervor. He wanted to feel her touch again and anything to garner another touch of her soft skin against his rough flesh was a jubilant welcome.

The first day he had realized no amount of miles would rid him of her, he had all but set in a stew of hysterical panic he had not known for eons. But as he calmed and his mind cleared he began to think soberly of the implications as his mind and heart soothed from the foreign emotions so long bereft in him.

Darkness raged at him for yearning for such a pittance of tenderness he needed not, but gone were the malicious spurts of loathing where the blackness scolded himself for craving her tender touches and kind words.

Her warmth was too precious, too fine a wine to spit out like sour ale. If his pride was to be surrendered to her for the time being, to cool the fever she induced within, then so be it.

Thoughtlessly, a hand dipped into his leather jerkin pocket. Cold metal met his flitting talons, sending a pulse of assurance and glee speeding through him.

A warm smile creased his lips as he fingered the precious gift for his mistress. An icy, silver chain and diamond pendant from Pandora's Box itself lay nestled next to his heart until the jewelry could be delivered safety to his owner. The amulet was famed and surrounded by the mists of time and legend and now would grace the neck of his owner if she would accept his thanks for granting him leave.

Picking up the jewel from the belly of his abandoned Dark Castle, after all his plans were said and done and ready to be enacted, had been but a fanciful whim that took him thrall and made him giddy. A gift would testify he was behaving at least and strove to please his kind mistress.

Perhaps, he dared hope in the depths of his dark souls, she would be so grateful she might clasp his hand or touch his face again as she had done before. Oh to feel her again would be the greatest of rewards for pleasing the mistress.

Patting his pocket reassuringly, the fiend began to descend the grassy cline with a nimble ease. Hidden rocks behind tufts of grass and gnarled roots that jutted out perilously from the slope were no hindrance to his light steps. Normally he would have used magic to ferry him back to the stronghold, but the hot day added with the cooling kiss of wind that tousled his straggly mane was too great a luxury to pass up.

Besides, he chuckled happily to himself as he skirted a sprawling wheat field and made working serfs halt their labor, drop their hoes and pitchforks, and stare at him wide eyed in dull terror, the longer he took upon his trek back to his mistress's domain, the longer he could dwell upon her lovely face and preen over his plots.

~8~8~

"Where is he?" Belle murmured tensely under a baited breath as she stared out the pane of her chamber window.

The placement of her room gave her a fine view of the gray flagstone courtyard that displayed the entire, ground outlay neatly like a charcoal colored handkerchief embroidered with black iron.

Worry clouded across her lovely features as she scanned the men at arms lazily marching on their patrols amongst the palace grounds or languishing in the shade of the keep. Carriages with their noble crests painted and glided upon their sides constantly arrived and departed with nobles and courtiers and folk of business making Belle all the more anxious.

Sarah chuckled motherly to herself as she stared up from sewing a small tear in one of her charges green silken gowns. Wear had not worn the exquisite fabric, but moths who feasted on the unused attire of the princess who had always preferred simple peasant clothes rather than the heavily hooped, ornate gowns that were so much in style with the young ladies of the courts.

An aged smile dimpled her rotund, cheery face as she turned back to her stitching with a chuckle. "Never you fear missus, your knight will arrive in due time. It might seem eternity, but have no doubt he will come."

Everyone believed her anxiety was conjured from Gaston's absence! Forcing her tongue not to lash out in a stinging revelation, the beauty stared intently down upon the stone as though it would suddenly catch aflame from her hardened glare.

How she wished to scream at them all, even her dear Papa and Sarah. Gaston was the last man upon her mind! Gaston arriving sounded her ears of a plague upon the horizon. Rather he be delayed than coming nearer with every fleeting moment.

No, he was not the man her mind was enthralled to think of.

Her Rum dashed across her thoughts at every waking hour he had not been near. Hours she wandered through the halls, thinking of him without relent. How she wished to be down in his lair and fussing about his potions, or at the very least call upon him for a small talk.

Of course she had attributed her constant thinking of him with nothing more than apprehension of him trying some loophole to fetch his kris at first, but quickly dropped the foolish notion. In a way, even without the dagger for assurance, she trusted his very word. He would not betray her, but that in turn begged the question why she was on pins and needles to hear his tittering laugh and see the light glimmering off his gray-gold scales that made him look handsome and intriguing all at once.

Part of her took a ridiculous notion that mayhap she missed him. Perhaps his light hearted or morbid quips and flamboyant actions had sowed a fondness of him that had bloomed in her heart.

Twisting her fingers nervously, Belle forced herself up and away from her pillowed perch by the window. Staring down till gray and black spots danced in her vision was no help. Only being back would help, and even better if Gaston was delayed!

Her soul wished to spew what lingered in the recesses of her heart. But none would understand it was not Gaston she wished to see.

"It's not simply that, Sarah, it's…." The beauty stared down at her hands as she fiddled with them warily. How could she explain things she did not even comprehend herself?

Opening her mouth to speak again, ready to pour out what lay dormant in her soul, good or ill, Belle began to address her long time friend, but was overcome by another blustering sound.

A horn blasted bellowed through the air ringing about the palace in an echoing thunder. The heralding sound could have been heard even in the depths of Rum's lair, announcing the arrival of one whom the entire kingdom favored.

Ice plummeted in the beauty's belly as her shoulders slumped dourly. Of all the times and all the moments….

"Your knight has arrived!" Sarah crowed delightedly as she placed the dress aside and sprang up like a woman twenty five years her junior. Smoothing out the crimped wrinkles in her yellow smock the plump guardian began to pluck and arrange the beauty's rather simple garb as though she were on her way to a ball. "Now stand tall, greet him warmly, but not to excitedly." She instructed primly as she began to lead the now slow Belle like a rebellious donkey.

"Don't be so nervous." She encouraged, obvious as to what hampered the beauty's every step as though she walked in a morass.

Love and eagerness certainly had nothing to do with her inching steps or the deep frown lined upon her smooth skin. Today she would have to face Gaston. Today would be the start of planning her wedding and forging the chain of lace about her neck to be bound with a man she found, at best, childishly ignorant and priggishly revolting.

Sarah patted her now pallid cheek tenderly. "Oh come now child, at the very least grin through your wariness. You look as though you're headed to the hangman's noose!"

Better that than to greet the man she would die a slow, painful death of a cloistered life, Belle bit back in a stinging retort that wished to spew from her lips. How was it no one could see her distaste towards the man?

Had they known would they even look upon her favorably for speaking her heart?

Swallowing down the trite thought she managed an insipid smile as she walked the lonely corridors down to her fiancé and dreary fate.

~8~8~

Gaston wiped his sweaty, Neanderthal brow with the back of his fine crimson tunic sleeve as he stood, tall and dignified, as any gentleman would in the heat awaiting for his betrothed to allow him entry in the palace.

To his side, in the shade of a massive, towering oak never dislodged from the large courtyard, a host of finely painted, richly attired noble women and courtiers and ladies in waiting sat on stone benches covered by cotton. Prim nobles languorously fanned themselves from the blistering heat and talked in coy giggles behind ornate fans.

Most of the rouge and heavy dyes smeared upon their faces as though they had been weeping, but that did not keep the brute from sparing glances at them all the same.

One in particular, a fiery redhead with lupine eyes and a pursed mouth of crimson, stared at him fearlessly and with more than a look of innocence maidens of her caliber were rumored to tout ostentatiously. Daring and intrigue sparked in her eyes for him, telling him she was one to spend his nights dallying with and never would she speak a word of their affair.

Yes, Gaston noted to himself with a smug grin as he straightened his tunic and flashed a charming grin to the swooning, tittering ladies, he would be talking with her later once his greeting and pleasantries were all said and done.

The great double doors that led to the entry of the citadel groaned in protest as the ancient portals swung wide. The steel banded barriers collided to the stone in a soft boom like far away thunder revealing the prize that would lead him to so much more than a failing fiefdom and knighthood.

Belle walked out into the peerless light somberly. Her hands clasped tightly in front of her and her face was nothing more than a regal neutrality. One might have thought she were about to attend a funeral of some distant cousin rather than greet her betrothed. Other women would have laughed and smiled and ran towards him with arms outspread, but she did not.

Abruptly, as though she had just found inspiration or relief from a troubling thought, her eyes alight in sheer delight. Happiness banished the melancholy that clouded her porcelain skin and lovely features as though it had never been.

Surely, the knight preened narcissistically, no woman, not even the strange freak, Belle could resist his debonair charms and rugged handsomeness.

Taking a single step forward grandly as though he were about to fall upon a knee, Gaston smiled widely to his wife to be. Practiced words of love and endearment began to tumble from his mouth. "My dear-."

As though never noticing his existence the beauty stared past him with eyes that sparkled like the purest of sapphires. "Rum!" The beauty blurted, uncaring of the propriety.

The Dark One kept to the side of the gate creeping clandestinely like a shadow amongst the guards and retainers and retinue that had accompanied the brute. Too many he looked like some struggling beggar having found a way inside the gathering but oh he was so much more.

No one else had noticed him with the ragged cloak cowl pulled far over his scaled visage to avoid a ruckus, but Belle knew him. She would have known her Rum had there been a thousand of him all alike before her.

The cloaked figure paused like a rabbit spotted by hound's eyes, though far from afraid at being spotted. Indeed, part of Belle knew instinctively he relished being pointed out by those who feared him when such suited his fancy.

Pulling the hood back slowly, he dipped his dirty head once in a subservient bow. He had not been planning to make himself known until the end of Gaston's greeting but since she had hailed him he saw no reason to keep hidden as though ashamed.

Though others about him gasped and scuffled away, he felt only pride, and not the normal satisfaction he had of terrifying foolish mortals, that she had smiled and greeted him before the lout of a knight.

Gaston cleared his throat loudly, almost in a disapproving growl. The surly grumble called Belle's attention back to his towering form looking up to her from far below the pyramid of marble steps she stood upon.

Smilingly tightly to keep his calm, he bowed respectfully. "My lady, I have returned as I promised I would." Motioning to a ragged vassal next to his jet black charger, his barrel chest swelled proudly. "In honor of once more basking in your beauty, I have brought but a small token of my esteem and love for you; a gift to mimic how gorgeous you are."

The low, scurrying serf placed a package in the knight's hands before scuttling off like a beaten dog. Gaston was some what known for ill treating his people.

The brute smiled dashingly as he produced his gift from under a flannel shroud. "A dozen of the finest roses my land offers." He revaled charmingly.

Each rose was cut as perfectly as the next. Their silken petals were the color of fresh blood and their stems were a flawless dark green.

Smiling thinly, but little else, Belle nodded in acknowledgement of his gift. "Why thank you, Gaston. Such lovely flowers."

"An old beggar woman who was trying to unlawfully peddle on my land had them." He explained easily, taking pride in his power as though Belle would approve as many already did. "I was to have them destroyed like the rest of her flowers, but I saw these and thought of you."

Could the man do nothing without causing misery, Belle wished to scream. Before she could find her voice in her growing outrage, the knight turned to the Dark One. His cold eyes narrowed hatefully towards the fiend who grinned back nastily. The events of their last meeting still flashed in his mind as though they had happened yesterday and not months before.

"Come here, Beast." He beckoned in a simpering snarl like a master to a stubborn dog. He extended the beautiful flowers and nudged his head to Belle. "Come and fetch these for your mistress; give them to her."

In any other instance the fiend would have darted a glance to his mistress to know her will and gauge how to act. Now, however, he didn't even need to spare a look her way to know he was in no wrong and under no compulsion to do as the brute wished.

"Sorry, Dearie, I don't take commands from those who barely know how to count all their fingers and toes and barely can conceive which way to hold the end of a sword." Rumpelstiltskin giggled in his eerie trill.

Somewhere in the crowd a lone soul snickered at the taunt.

Anger all too readily filled the knight at the mocking of the monster in man-flesh. His eyes hardened into icy stone as a hand slid down threateningly to the hilt his sword. "Men have lost their lives for lesser insults, Beast. You do not think I would take the same offence to a clever animal mocking me?"

"My, my struck a nerved did I?" The fiend queried teasingly. A black talon tapped the side of his chin curiously as though Gaston intrigued him.

The crowd hastily parted to be away from the Dark One's path as he languorously stepped forward to face the brute. Ease and stinging mocking laced his scaled features as he grinned maliciously at the idiot. He chuckled and slowly circled the knight. "And come to think of it, you have no right to talk of calling anyone an animal, ass. I have been wondering when I changed your body back, did I inadvertently leave the mind of a pack mule in your dense skull."

Gaston bristled like a prodded bull at the mention of his transformation out loud. Smoke could have billowed out his nostrils as he stared the fiend down with a death glare that could have melted stone and frozen Hades fire.

His words were more frigid than chips of ice in the coldest realms of their world. "Bold words for an imp who knows a few parlor tricks rather than winning battle with steel and might." He spat hatefully, his face darkening with seething rage. "You have to rely on villainous magic to back up your words don't you, Beast? Without magic you're just a harmless little grass snake ready for its head to be sliced off."

Rumpelstiltskin barked a genuine laugh. His head tossed back briefly as he roared in amusement at the knights expense. "Funny, Dearie." He wiped away fake tears of amusement from his eyes and pranced about the moron. "But magic or no magic I could easily beat you." He paused his circling and spared a glance to his anxious owner hoping he was not overstepping his bounds.

Belle stared warily, her lovely features troubled and yet perhaps a light of vehement approval for her servant who dared confront the brute.

"I could beat you without raising a hand or blade." He finished confidently, seeing had not deemed to scold him or halt their interaction at present.

"Are you a fool?" Gaston uttered a brash chortle. He jabbed a thick thumb into his jutting chest proudly. "I am the man who slew a score of ogres without the use of witches tricks." He proclaimed proudly and slowly unsheathed his blade. Brandished steel swayed loosely in murderous desire in his free hand. "You think you can best me without magic and without a blade then I can easily defeat you with one hand." He shook the flowers in his left hand in a failed attempt to taunt the fiend.

At that, the crowd roared their support at their champion. The name of Gaston resounded through the heated courtyard. Even the ladies under the awning of leaves set up dainty cheer before swooning and settling again like a flock of silly geese in the midst of a blood bath.

The fiend chuckled manically and heaved his shoulders in a nonchalant shrug. "If you say so, Dearie. Let us see if your skill is something to be vaunted or are your boasts to big for your expertise."

In a hearts beat, without waiting any presets or intervention from the beauty, the knight dove in eagerly to shed the Dark One's blood and teach him a lesson. Too long had he merely stood there letting the fiend use his clever tongue and mock him. Now was time to silence the taunted with blood and screams.

Too see him bleeding and begging for mercy upon the ground would be a balm to the brute's tarnished pride. Once he was on his knees pleaded for clemency then perhaps Belle could see exactly what kind of animal her Beast was - a coward.

A blood curdling roar that resounded from the stone erupted from Gaston's lips as he charged murderously towards Rumpelstiltskin. One hand wielded his cared for blade expertly whilst the other clutched the fine roses in a death grip. A few petals dropped away in the rush, but nothing to disfigure their beauty.

Steel hissed viciously through the air as he swung down to cleave the fiend in two. Sunlight flashed from the blade as he aimed for the Dark One's neck, hoping to dig the steel deep in his hide.

Belle began to cry out for the murderous contest to desist at once, but a quick gaze from the fiend silenced the cry dead upon her tongue as though her throat had shriveled. There was an asking for trust she knew instinctively in the heart beat glance he allotted her. A trust she was wiling to give no matter how much she despised them fighting.

Perhaps, a part of her wished to see if Gaston would get his comeuppance for his cruel words and brutish actions.

The Dark One smiled impishly as he easily sidestepped the swing with only a small step to his left.

Gaston staggered forward, fighting hard to keep his balance. His blade clacked lightly against the cobblestone as he fought simply to stand aright from his vicious swing.

Rumpelstiltskin's hands rested behind his back as he calmly clucked his tongue and shook his head in mock pity at the knight's utter stupidity. "Such a sloppy strike. Are you trying to score a hit or chop wood?"

Furious, Gaston wheeled dangerously upon the Dark One. Enraged for being made a fool, the brute spat a foul curse, improper for any ladies ears, as he tried his hand again in bringing a wound to the terror.

His blade whistled ominously in a diagonal slash aiming for Rumpelstiltskin infuriating smirk to cut the grin off his face.

The fiend veered away from the hit once more and nimbly kept backwards as Gaston's strike turned from the feigned slash into a pointed lunge for his gut.

Keeping himself from laughing outright he drew savory satisfaction from witnessing the fools face redden as his tricks were spoiled one by one. The knight indeed was skilled, but not as expert as the monster in the ways of tactics and combat.

"You see." The Dark One explained almost happily as though teaching a pupil whilst the brute slashed and stabbed and chopped at him to no avail. "Fighting is not about how many blows you hit." He ducked his head from a wide swing and popped up once more, now behind the knight, to continue easily. "It is about learning to keep the blade out of your hide while you wait for the most opportune moment to deliver the one blow your foe never thought of." At that, Rumpelstiltskin lightly pushed the battle hardened knight with a foot in the rear, causing the brute to stumble forward.

A bestial growl spat past the knights lips as he charged again and lunged at the fiend like a rabid bear. His mind over boiled with frothing, blinding fury as he attacked with every trick he knew simply to desire the satisfaction of watching the beast writhe impaled through his sword like a slaughtered pig.

The knight swung, the fiend ducked. Gaston stabbed, Rumpelstiltskin pivoted upon his heel. The brutish lout arched the blade and the cunning beast pranced from side to side in a jesting taunt.

Rose petals flew with every deadly swing as the precious flowers were slowly marred and destroyed with the force of battle in the hands of the lummox Gaston.

Mostly silence reigned in the heated courtyard as knight and sorcerer circled once another; one fighting like a enraged beast and the other almost dancing a harvest jig to mock his opponent who had not come near to landing a hit.

People stared spell bound at the scene, their eyes growing wider with each swing and miss and mocking cackle from the fiend and new spurt of rose petals flying into the heated air. Many cheered silently for Gaston as braver souls called out advice and words of encouragement to their champion, for if their beloved knight could not win against the Beast their princess miraculously kept leashed in the dungeons then who could?

Belle searched the batted intently, her hands curled tightly into fists against her fluttering stomach. Ice froze her blood dead in her veins as she nary dared breath less she interrupt the Dark One's concentration on dodging the cruel bite of the blade. Her nails dug deep into her skin until she flinched to keep herself from shaking every time Gaston swung out at her Rum.

Long, crawling minutes dragged by in the raging summer heat as Gaston plowed forward and the Dark One coolly brushed aside the blow as though the brute was a petulant child waving a toy about in a tantrum.

Sweat dripped profusely from his brow and drenched his redden face like rain. Bellowing breath heaved in low gasps as his swings flagged and his steps slowed in the heat. He could be a vicious opponent, but never had he not landed a single blow on any he had faced!

"Getting tired?" Rumpel mocked lazily, deciding he'd had enough of toying with the brute. He chuckled flippantly and turned his back upon the knight without the slightest hint of wariness, his talons flourishing lazily through the air. "And here I thought mules were hardy creatures."

At the last taunt, the knight abandoned all fatigue and what little reason he possessed in the heat. Dredging up the last draughts of his strength for a blow that could have embedded his blade into solid rock, he raced blindly behind the Dark One. Such a blow was more than dishonorable from a knight who had been challenged to fair combat.

"Rum!" Belle cried desperately to alert her beast, but there was no need.

Abruptly the fiend turned back as though he had forgotten to deliver another taunting bite. Hands flying to the silver clasp of his cloak he unpinned the mantle and tossed the fabric at the knight as though he were some matador.

A cry of surprise blurted from the knight's lips as he tumbled into the ragged cloak with too much inertia to avert his path. Throwing his hands up, he let his blade and the decimated flowers to go flying in a desperate attempt to not entangle himself.

Smiling in satisfaction the Dark One, plucked a singular flower, nearly bereft of its petals from mid air expertly. The rest fell in a heap upon the grounded, flailing Gaston who grunted and swore vehemently as he tried to free himself from the shroud.

Walking towards his mistress, the fiend lazily waved his claws over the pale green nub of the bloom. Dark purple magic swirled in a small, glassy-like orb under his hand in only a faint spurt of power. Mist evaporated into the refreshing breeze leaving the flower as good as before without blemish.

In one smooth motion Rumpelstiltskin dropped to his knees obediently in front of his mistress.

Head bowed lowly, he offered up the singular, now unmarred rose. "For you, my mistress." He remarked reverently, ignoring the muffled cries of absolute outrage from the brute who struggled to be rid of the cloak that enveloped him. Daring to lift his voided eyes to her, his smirk told his humble tone was little more than show. Placing his head down reverently once more, he added. "If you'll have it."

Punishment was surely to come, he was certain, after such an escapade of abjectly humiliating her betrothed. One in private and now in public he had made the knight a fool. But all punishment from the blade at her displeasure would be worth it he knew. Even getting harmed in the sight of Gaston would be worth it. Soon word would spread of his utter defeat and that was triumph enough.

Tensed, he awaited the stabs of torment to assail his form and rend his flesh and claw at his nerves, and yet none came. Not a single ounce of pain seeped into his form. Even the slight inkling he felt tickle him rarely at her displeasure was nowhere to be felt.

Daring a glance at her features, he stared at her curiously for a moment. Was she not upset her groom to be had been thoroughly degraded by a slave and sent clawing upon his back like an upended turtle?

"No punishment, my mistress?" He inquired just loud enough for a now free Gaston to hear. To know he would not be tormented or disciplined after beating the cur so thoroughly seemed a delectable victory he would savor like the purest of honey.

"Punish?" Gaston echoed the word dumbly as he finally managed to be free with the help of his guards. Tatters of the burgundy cloak still hung in his fisted grip as he stomped up the stairs. All thought of niceties and gentlemanly grace ghosted away as he planted himself angrily beside the fiend.

He pointed to the monster accusingly like a spoiled child. "Belle, if you can punish this Beast I demanded he be flogged for his impudence. If you let me, I shall flog him myself."

For a moment Belle stared at them both. Indecisiveness flickered in her orbs as she her mind ran on how to quell the situation. Under no circumstance would she allow her Rum to be beaten, especially at the cruel hands of Gaston. Knowing the vengeance that lurked in his black heart, he would beat him till he were nothing more than a indiscernible mess of striped, agonized flesh.

"Now Gaston." She sighed finally and turned to him making the knight beam momentarily as though his whining would be rewarded. "You lost to him fairly without magic. Admit defeat graciously and we can get past this nonsense."

For a moment, Gaston blinked stupidly as though not comprehending. She scolded him while in a way praising her slave.

"Of course." He strained through grit teeth.

Dipping his head in the faintest of acknowledgments to the Dark One, though the gall of doing such a thing must have burned a whole right through his stomach, he turned back to Belle. Eyes cold he stared at her darkly as though his loss had been her fault. "I hope that now we may go inside and talk of more important things?" He asked trying to seem careless, but failing. How it nagged him to give an ounce of deference to the Beast!

"Yes we shall." She replied with a wide smile. Biting her under-lip as Gaston passed and stomped into the castle, her eyes danced in a merry amusement.

She was not displeased at all, he knew know with a staunch certainty that made his heart warm like the sun heating the stones. His heart larked to her glinting eyes that made him wish to laugh. In a way, his mistress was vastly pleased.

As the fiend rose, Belle, he noticed perceptively held the rose close to her bosom. Her delicate fingers fingered the emerald stem as she leaned closer to the fiend as though loosing her balance. "I'm glad you're back, Rum." She whispered in a smile into his ear and departed.

A grin etched widely upon his lips as he watched his owner follow her surly betrothed into the dark coolness of the keep. Having her speak such word was a better prize than humiliating the fool Gaston.

He could win her over faster than the brute ever could, the fiend knew suddenly. A wider grin stretched upon his lips as he snapped his fingers to bring magic to his call and ferry him down to his lair.

Yes, if he even dared put his mind to it, he could be better to Belle than the knight ever could.

Abruptly, the Dark One recalled the fine amulet pocketed in his jerkin. A that moment he could have raced to her and delivered the gem, but some how, the rose seemed such a worthier gift to his mistress who enjoyed the simple things.

~8~8~

All the world seemed dark to the Belle as she entered the dim citadel. Using the excuse to let her eyes ajudst to the bleak shadow, the beauty did not readily follow her surly betrothed like a leashed dog.

His hulking form was a mountainous dot, bristling with utter outrage, far along the hall as he marched angrily down into the main parlor to await his bride to be. Abruptly he turned a corner and a door slammed, telling the beauty he was none to pleased.

Perhaps that was why she couldn't halt her grin, she considered with a light chuckle.

All alone for a few moments, Belle ducked behind a column to avoid the eyes of any bustling servants who ran carrying the gossip of their champions defeat. The cool stone soothed her heated flesh as she leaned against the marble pillar.

Holding the rose close to her racing heart she sniffed the bloom. A soft, fond smile played upon her lips as the fragrance of roses and magic drifted pleasantly about her. Her fingers stroked the silken petals delicately as though they would break as she stared down at the beauteous flora.

Of course a servant woman would gather the ruined heap of flowers wilting upon the heated flagstones and attempt to slavage them before putting the now damaged roses in her room, but this one Rum had given her…this one she would keep close to her heart.


	12. Dreams

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals! :3_

**~8~8~**

Honeyed light slanted warmly through the towering spider veined windows of Belle's inner chamber as the beauty awoke abnormally late in the morning. Each window was slightly yawned open to allow what coolness the summer night wrought upon its refreshing winds.

The sun was already in an early arch over the flawless heavens and peasants and merchants had long since lumbered happily to their toils and thrown open the shutters to their shop windows and the dark doors which beaconed buyers and thieves alike.

Bird tittered upon the gables and precipices of the gothic castle roof as though still bidding the morn greeting with their glorious songs. In tune with their gaily chirping ballads, the townsmen below resounded with the hardy sounds of arguing business and offering light jests.

Normally the beauty arose with the slate gray tint that covered the firmament where the sun only lightly kissed the treetops and the bird were only beginning to trill their songs. Only the hardiest of workers were up with their princess, and a scant few servants who tended the kitchens scurried about so early when she was already up and peeping about.

However, working with Gaston and combing over the preliminary wedding plans had been a lengthy trial worthy of the most tenacious warriors. Evening had slowly waned into night as they droned in kind talks of plans of their matrimony. By the time she had finished and delved down into the dark lair to sup with her Rum, she was nearly falling asleep in her soup!

Through the quaint talks and oft boorish jests, her energy was spent politely worming herself out of his sword calloused grip. Though Gaston thought himself being tender and lovingly mischievous with a comforting touch, to Belle he pawed at her with every chance allotted him out of the eyesight of the dutiful Sarah or the coming and going servants dipping in and out of their parlor with tiny squares of dainty pastries and sweetmeats that all turned to ash upon her tongue.

She shivered unpleasantly as his battle hardened hands rested on her knee or his grip wrapped about her arm like it would have a swords hilt only far gentler. Even as she expertly slipped from his grip at every turn and only, at best, smile wanly at his whispered words of affection, he never saw the hint. Not until he left the parlor for his quarters had she been able to rest her guard for weaseling out of his hands.

The kiss they shared as he departed, a faint peck on the lips and no more for noble proprieties sake, tasted bitter and foul upon her lips. Never once when they kissed had she truly enjoyed the taste of him. He tasted of force and dark, sour beer and tanners mixtures that made his kills into morbid works of art he called trophies.

Licking her lips the beauty crinkled her nose in vast distaste. Even a day later and she could still taste his foul mouth over hers; wanting more, but staying his desire to deepen their kiss.

And it would all begin all over today; the 'playful' pawing, the sugar coated words of adoration, and the kiss he would sneak at the end as was expected of them.

Banishing the abhorrent thought that sobered her normal love of morning, Belle turned fitfully under the silver silken coverlet that outlined her sensuous form down to the last curve. Her sweat drenched shift clung to her body telling the night had not brought much relief from the heat. With the heat even raging in the dead of night hardly anyone slept with little more than a dampened night tunic that hung close to the skin.

Smiling into the golden beams that slanted through the panes she breathed the deep scents of morning and the last perfume of sleep drifting away until the night once more allowed it to steal upon her. Gray dust motes caught in the oblique rays of day danced carelessly in the golden glow before falling into invisibility upon the floor. Behind the shifting, gauzy blue curtains of the windows, the sky was a deep sapphire with nary a curdled cloud to be seen wandering the endless heavens.

For a moment she imagined all was well and that no Gaston slumbered in the palace only a few corridors away and no one expected anything of her. Staring at the whirling motes that tumbled to the floor softly like fledglings down, the beauty even dared dream she boasted no title of princess or noble, but perhaps head for the royal library who tended and repaired aging books.

Closing her eyes softly, she sighed contentedly at the thought of being nestled in a bigger library which vaunted thousands of books from every corner of the realms. In such a place she would have happily spent her years under the worn parchment and squid ink translating literature and penning tales nearly lost to history.

Invariably pleased with the humble, holistic thought, her azure eyes opened again, as she once more quelled the horrid thought of the ignoble Gaston. Her gaze flashed to her nightstand on a whim as though some inner force prompted her movement.

Warmth flared in her heart to see the vibrant ruby petals of the rose, as perfect as the day before, resting upon her most favorite tome.

Not a single petal withered or crinkled during the balmy night. The bright jade of the stem looked as though the precious flower had just been snipped from the bush and placed upon her bed stand by a caring lover who had long since crept away.

Plucking up the token, Belle cradled the item close to her chest. Fresh scents that reminded her of spring in exile and her sanctuary sprang involuntarily into her mind. Oh to be free in the cottage once again; to simply be unfettered from the chains of duty! Breathing in the aroma of the precious rose, another faint perfume wafted from the satin petals - magic.

The strange fragrance of her slaves sickly sweet powers that renewed the bud into a blossomed rose, once so odd and ominous to her, seemed the loveliest of that ever graced any rose.

Seeing the rose reminded her of Rumpelstiltskin and smelling the bloom nearly made her think he was there. As she smoothed her fingers down along the stem she could not help but fancy the feel was instead his gray-gold skin.

"Rum." She whispered in a soft smile under her breath; unable to resist his name upon her tongue.

Where Gaston's name only brought the taste of coal and cinders, her Rum's moniker dashed upon her tongue like the sweetest of wines. At times in her dreams she only wished to speak his name over and over to be drunk upon his title!

Shifting to her back, she twirled the rose thoughtfully between her fingers.

Beastly her Rum could be, but there was a gentleness to him part of her thought only she could see past the scales and quips. He could be kind and thoughtful when in the mood took him thrall, and even in his most savage, he was not as fearful as she had once supposed.

To be sure there was darkness and cruelty lurking in the depths of his black heart, but not a maliciousness that was innately born and bred into some. There were others who were born into the world simply to cause misery and pain and torment the weaker for sport or their own ends in everything. Vileness ran thick through their veins as did blood, and yet her Rum did not seem so.

To Belle he seemed as a man downtrodden and pushed so long when he held a scrap of power his thoughts went to vengeance. The cruelty of others oft help goad the cruelty of those who were once kind and gentle as part of her believed he had once been.

In a way she could not comprehend him being totally, invariably corrupt. No matter how hard and cruel he seemed, it simply didn't fit and no amount of morbid quips or strange skin could make him appear wholly so.

"You called, my mistress?" The falsetto timbre of the Dark One echoed through her chamber suddenly, severing her thoughts like a hot blade through a thin horse hair.

Taken aback, Belle swiveled her head to the windows at an alarming speed. The haste made her head spin akin to a top as she viewed her servant coolly sitting upon her plush creamy colored window seat in her quarters.

His tight leather attire of somber brown, always without a thread out of place, donned his form as though he had never once closed his eyes to rest. His skin glittered merrily like gold in the light as he peered at her perceptively with his ebony orbs. The glow of the sun made his eyes seem so much fuller and not hollow and voided as she once imagined. There was a soul behind his onyx depths, and maybe his eyes were the clear showing of his soul; all black, but not so utterly dark no light would ever flicker in them.

His eyes narrowed upon her only increased the fact that she wore little under her the thin coverlet.

Legs and arms crossed, he tilted his head slightly to the left studying like a curious animal. "You call and I must come." He stated lightly as though giving an excuse for his sudden appearance where he most certainly did not belong.

A sly smile wove capriciously upon his odd face to mask the utter trepidation that shivered through his sinewy form like jolts of crackling lightening. Blood galloped like mad horses through his veins and pounded in his ears with the strength of a thousand dwarves at hard labor in their mines. His heart slammed mightily against the cage of his chest as he feigned ease he did not at all feel.

Too be in her bedchamber with her alone! But it had not been his fault, he noted trying to keep his mask of outer calm from crumbling, she had summoned him and he had no choice but to come to her behest.

Oh but tearing his eyes away from her was another matter entirely. No mask could make him avert his eyes scanning her slender form beneath the covers that clung fittingly to her body. He could see every curve against the silver sheen of the coverlet. Only a staunch will kept him from ogling her like a dumb struck peasant and simply look in control and nonchalant about the whole affair.

Fire alit Belle's cheeks in a delicate pink at the realization he was in her chamber unattended. No man had ever entered the belly of her quarters past the lavish parlor and the gilded day room. If Sarah had walked in at that precise moment, she would have most certainly fainted away with the thought of a man, even the Dark One, she did not quite consider a man in her mistress' inner quarters all while she was still abed.

Hands grasped the silken edge of the blanket desperately as she hauled up the cover to her chest to make certain nothing showed even with the light ivory shift glued to her body by sweat.

With him in her quarters, peering at her wolfishly, she felt vulnerable, dagger or no.

For a few tenuous seconds, the beauty stared, oddly stupefied and bashful by his presence. Fear did not surge through her as she once imagined, but a fire, hotter than the blazing sun, that twirled in her belly in foreign ways she could not explain.

Shaking her head as though to rid herself of some enchantment, the beauty stammered hesitantly towards her slave. "R-um…I…well." Her voice tapered away uncertainly. She had spoken his name but had not meant for him to actually heed the moniker as a call. Had she truly wanted him?

"I'm sorry." She breathed in a steadying sigh to soothe her roiling emotions. "I hadn't meant to call you and drag you away from sleep."

A strange chuckle rumbled in his throat as he flippantly twiddled his black talons through the air. "No need for apology. I don't sleep much, mistress. My powers are more than enough to keep me from such a tedious thing reserved for mortals."

"If you don't sleep then how do you dream?" Belle shifted to a sitting position in her masterful craved, large oval bed. Her hands still desperately clutched the silvery linen to her chest as she searched him thoughtfully.

Any subject to veer away from the fact she was half naked and he was sitting in her bedchamber was a grateful welcome to banish the awkwardness back into the shadowed corners.

Dark clouds shrouded his features. Eyes of endless midnight flickered down to the blue, rug strewn floor. "I try not to dream." He replied lowly, abruptly somber. A snarl faintly twitched upon his lips like a wary dog warning away a stranger or a troublesome thought. "I hate dreams."

Dreams were whims never to be realized. Dreams were the coarse salt scourged upon the never healing wounds of his weeping soul and the bane that kept him from closing his eyes in hopes of peaceful repose.

When he dreamed he dreamed of his Bae and being happy before he met with his fears at the edge of the portals iris and dashed his dreams to shreds. Once he had dreamed of working as a spinner in Maurice's kingdom. With the peace and prosperity, he would have been happy here leading a simple spinner's life.

To the Dark One, dreams were the poisoned fangs that brought heart ache. Dreams where an acrid venom that stole through his soul and his nightmares beyond all other terror, for what was a worse nightmare than seeing the only one that ever cared for him and waking up with without their laughter and smiles once so real in the realms of imagination and nothing more?

"Dreams can be sad at times." Belle conceded in a sober shrug. Ease glided through her as the awkwardness tapered away as smoke upon the breeze. After only a few moments with him, she felt her senses once more returning and the ease she normally felt begin to thaw the ice of wariness about her soul.

Unbinding her thick, umber braid of hair to occupy herself rather than keep the thought he was alone with her in her chamber, she stared ponderously at the spears of light traced upon her sheets. "Some dreams can hurt or even cause pain when they're impossible, but dreams keep us hoping for better things and keep us always wanting to find something better even though it may never come true."

Rumpelstiltskin eyes flashed surreptitiously to his owner. Her words, so lovely and sweet seemed make him wish he could believed her. But after all, he noted dourly with a sting of bitterness, she was a gorgeous princess and what dreams could not be afforded her would surely be made up or forgotten by some other luxury.

In his dreams he wished to turn back time, but that was one thing the Dark One could not do.

Drumming his fingertips together lightly he stared as though she were some foreign animal. "And, uh, what pray tell have been your dreams, mistress?"

A mirthful smile laconically flashed upon her lips. "I always wanted a grand adventure. Too discover a lost treasure or become a rambler looking for excitement wherever it fell upon me." Laughter, like the sound of a renewed fount bubbled merrily from her lips. Her eyes twinkled in the golden light towards her Rum. "I suppose, I already fulfilled part of my dream."

Grinning lazily, the fiend leaned against the glass. "And is it everything you hoped?" He queried, feigning boredom. Surly his thralldom was a the very least modest adventure to her senses.

"Well…." She shrugged bashfully. "I did want to see the world. That part didn't really work out, but I had my adventure and found something marvelous at the end."

She was talking of him, he knew in an instant. Breath departed from his lungs as he fought hard to keep a smile away from the edge his lips. She had said nothing, but he knew without a doubt she referred to himself.

For a moment the fiend stared almost in peculiar ardor of her. A smile ghosted thinly upon his lips as though he would break out into gales of laughter. Her words made his soul want to sing, too read the message in her words seemed the grandest of things.

He nearly opened his mouth to relate a dream he had nestled in the black folds of his heart. He nearly blundered and shared a yearning the dark morass of his soul had nurtured for days since her kindness had earned him a wary trust of her.

A dull click of a door seemed to echo like a blaring clarion call in the humble chamber.

Blood drained from the beauty's face as her head swiveled to the door. A wounded deer caught in the sights of a rabid wolf would have looked calmer than she.

"Sarah." Belle whispered anxiously under her breath. Light humming resounded behind closed doors as footsteps thudded again the stone. "She's in the parlor."

Rumpelstiltskin sighed languorously as though the words sparked not a trace of trepidation. "And getting nearer it seems." He observed, once more in full control of his emotions. What had he been thinking almost about to speak his heart to her? Licking his lips nonchalantly, he fought down a smile at the panic that welled within her. "I can't go till you give me leave, mistress, or shall I simply hide under the bed?"

"This is no time for jokes." The beauty scolded mildly, but a smile hinted upon the border of her lips nonetheless. Growing thud of booted feet made her grimace slightly, banishing the moment of mirth. "You may go." As the heavy footfalls slapped nearer she added quickly. "I probably won't have an opportunity to come down today, but I'll be there for dinner."

Rising, the Dark One bowed deeply reverent. "Of course, my mistress." He replied as the lilac hued smoke clawed at his leather attire and enveloped him in its misty mantle.

Dinner. The word clung to the tatters of his ancient his mind as he arrived back in his fetid lair. A sly grin crossed his lips as he strode lazily to his wheel. Sitting once more, the fiend began where he left off when his mistress had inadvertently summoned him.

His talons vapidly worked the wood in a thoughtful tedium as he combed over the seeded though growing in his mind. As the wheel creaked its ancient woes, he stared blankly out into the darkness, lost in contemplation.

If all day she would be caught with Gaston, then perhaps, he could at least make dinner something different, if not to make progress with his plots and perhaps lift her spirits at the same instance.

But it could not just be any dinner; the fiend admonished himself as he threaded the glimmering gold strand between two pinched fingers. No, this dinner had to be different; something she would soon not forget and work wondrously in his favor.

~8~8~

"Show me Gaston." Rumpelstiltskin growled thoughtfully as he stood in the murky depths of his ominous lair.

Cold air whipped far more fiercely in the belly of his sanctum where a rare few had dared tread. The darkness was a nether void where even the brightest of bonfire flames flickered pathetically in the drear.

Normally, he tread only a few steps in his home and never toward the vast center of his dungeon were piles of bones of the forgotten lay, but he dreaded the thought of Belle on a chance walking in to catch him in the act. He needed for his actions to stay a surprise of course.

A few globules of brilliant light he conjured with his dark powers clung like spiders to the stalagmites and stalagmites that surrounded him in the depths of the caverns. Pulsing radiance of no ordinary heat beat the blackness back almost to a shine of daylight so that the fiend could see properly.

In front of him stood a floor length mirror of ancient beauty; a relic to the realms. Carved feet, like covetous dragon claws, curled over large, glossy black orbs that seemed as though purplish mist swirled in their depths. The entire frame was a rich, dark mahogany wood and carved with the images of slender dragons viciously clawing up and down the sides. On the top, on either side, two rampant dragons roared at one another, their claws bared savagely and leathery wings outstretched and plumed in the air.

The silvery, almost shifting mirror quivered unstoppably as though a hand shook its frame. Its reflective surface became like liquid being whirled in a stewpot. A whirlpool of watery glass spun in a primal vortex in the center of the mirror until a blurred image began to show through the dizzying hypnotic whirl.

Vibrant colors melded together pleasantly and tore apart and changed as the glass once more became placid as a still lakes bed revealing the hulking form of Gaston.

Staring in utter distaste and hate of the brute, the fiend swallowed his dislike for the knight in order to learn from him. Gaston, brutish and ignorant as he was, was born a noble and moreover had learned the ways of a knight. Though he barely used his scruples around people other than noble folk, gentlemanly manners had been drilled into him since he could pick up a fork.

Staring intensively upon the fool, Rumpelstiltskin square his shoulders as he saw the brute act in noble presence. Jutting out his scrawny chest he placed one hand behind his back and attempted to stand in a courtly manner. Learning only came by doing, he whispered to himself in the back of his mind. If he wished to be a gentleman he had to learn from who was taught all his life how to be a gentleman, no matter how much he was not on the inside.

Behind him, a large slab of broken stalagmite sat upturned. Upon the rock rested an entire layout of any noble dinner set. Rather than the singular fork and plates and cups Belle brought down for them to sup, there behind him rested an array of dinner implements used at every eating occasion for nobles.

Four different silver forks, two spoons, and two knives he had pilfered from the kitchen lay in neat rows upon the cool stone. The three delicately crafted porcelain gold engraved plates sat in their rightful places and two alabaster, silken napkins with the crest of Maurice intricately stitched upon their fibers nestled in ornate silver clasps rested upon the plates. A quartet of fine glasses for holding wine and water and ale and one for in one broke all rested in its proper place. And all such finery and luxury was simply for one person!

Half the day had passed and he was still no expert as to what was what, or even how to properly hold the utensils. So long had he eaten nearly like an animal, he had forgotten how to properly wield forks and to slice and not saw at food with his knife. Spoons seemed atrocious little nuisances when he could simply bring the bowl to his mouth.

But such would be worth it, he dreamed proudly as he mimicked the courtly walk Gaston swaggered about. All the politeness and manners would be worth it to witness Belle's face when she saw the spread he put out for them and how civilized he seemed sipping wine instead of gulping it down and letting it run down his leather or using a fork instead of his claws.

For a moment he considered bathing, but then she hadn't made a comment to his aroma, and he didn't smell of blood and rot.

Oh yes, he smiled triumphantly to himself as he imagined his face. Her pleasure would be worth a few hours of tedious learning. In his minds eyes he could image her surprise to see him act gentlemanly instead of barbarically for once. _That_, she would remember and hopefully be a beacon of light in the days ahead for her.

Focusing on the brute one more he snapped his claws to beckon magic to his will. A blue upholstered seat appeared in a haze of power next to him. Following the knight he practiced pulling out a chair, his mind revolving on how utterly pleased his owner would be at his new found skills.

~8~8~

"Where is she?" Rumpelstiltskin murmured lowly to himself as he anxiously paced his lair.

The darkness that ruled the caverns had been combated with more orbs of light he summoned by magic. His dungeon seemed aglow showing the magnificence of the sprawling catacombs illumed in pallid shine.

Donned in his fine burgundy leather, he marched back and forth next to the worn rock they usually set to have dinner. The cold slab of sheered away stalagmite was laid out carefully with the fine china he had filched from the kitchens in order to impress her.

Though the world was far above him, he knew by sense the hour and the darkness that draped itself upon the heated world. Even the mists that rose from the cold stone was a blatant tell of the time. She should have been down an hour ago.

Of course, she could have fallen into trouble, but the dagger would alert him of any ill upon his mistress. So far the power of the kris had not even prodded him of any dastardly doings. He would have known if she were in peril, if simply by instinct than the prodding of the dagger beaconing him to protect his owner.

Perhaps she had forgotten, he reckoned but dashed the thought away quicker than it came. Belle always dined with him. It had become routine, even to the servants and Sarah, who somberly acknowledged her absence in the evening. Even her father had ceased his protest of his daughter spending dinner with a monster.

At least dinner down in his lair meant she didn't ask him to dine with them.

"So where is she?" He snarled quietly, his mind befuddled at her strange absence. A thousand scenarios dashed through his head, each more ridiculous than the last. She had to come, she simply had to.

Abruptly, a knock rapped timidly upon the thick door leaving his flustered thoughts in disarray. For hours he had been prepared and now he seemed to have nothing done to satisfaction.

Thrilled, the fiend raced towards the thick, oaken door. All lateness was forgiven as he prepared to admit her and display his act of civility.

Claws curled upon the brass door latch, he breathed deep and stood tall, remembering what he'd picked up from watching others. She would be impressed, he hoped in the depths of his heart.

As he opened the portal his happiness fell into nothingness as he viewed only the trailing pale skirt of a frightened servant girl racing about the corner in terror. At his feet rested their normal silver platter wafting with the aroma of pork and potatoes.

A small note that lingered faintly with Belle's lovely fragrance sat upon the covered plate.

Dread filled his gut as he plucked up the platter and disappeared inside like a surly beast at meal time. As the door banged shut he sat down upon the cold stone steps. Lead filled his heart dragging him down as he stared disappointingly at the epistle.

Abandoning the platter he warily eased open the yellowed vellum, knowing instinctively what he would find.

_Rum,_

_I hope you forgive me for missing dinner. Gaston and Papa cornered me to dine with them tonight and I think a few more. I sincerely hope you understand._

_-Belle_

Foolishness erupted within as he reread the simple, hastily scrawled note in her curling handwriting. Anger at himself roared into an inferno inside his heart. A dark profanity, foul enough to melt stone, spat acidly past his tongue, as he crumpled the letter in his fist.

The wailing winds that drafted in his lair seemed to laugh at him as he stared at the balled up parchment rolling about his scaled hand.

Idiot that he was.

Of course she was not coming on the night of all nights. The night where he chose to dredge up an inkling of his abandoned humanity, the night he felt to be something different than the cruel beast of lore, the night he actually cared and wished to raise her spirits from the crushing weight of Gaston.

A melancholic frown pulled upon his lips at the thought. Letting the paper tumble out of his grip, he watched dourly as the discarded parchment bounce down the slimy stone and roll away into darkness along with his heart.

He was a fool, the same fool he had been as a cowardly spinner.

Like everything else, his dreams only led to disappointment and heartache….


	13. Wayward Emotions

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals! Side note: What's in italics is Belle remembering. _

**~8~8~**

Belle sighed contentedly as she spun about her comfortable quarters in the lone hours of early morn. Charcoal gray light streamed insipidly into her chamber as she clutched her favorite azure dress by its corded chemise and whirled about the room as though the gown were another enchanted partner.

The worn hem swayed in session with her smooth steps as she twirled like a top dodging the richly carved furniture and the quilted edge of her bed. A quaint tune hummed from her throat as she danced to the melody. Her heart was fluttering and light and her smile easy as she hugged the dress to her thinly garbed form.

Though guilt nibbled at her spirit for missing normal supper with her Rum, she hadn't hated the night as she'd first imagined. To say the least she hadn't been pleased to miss their normal routine, but to say she had abhorred the night would have been a lie.

When her father and Gaston had cunningly cornered her into dining with them she had little choice of denying them both. Gaston was her betrothed after all, they cajoled to her as they all but led her to the dining hall, and at very least she should spend supper with her husband to be once and a while.

Of course Maurice was overjoyed his daughter had finally decided to abandon the fool notion of dining with an animal, if only for a night, and laughed louder and happier as Belle had ever seen him at the dinner table before or after the war.

_A ruddy hue of mirth dabbed her dear Papa's corpulent cheeks and graced his bloated face in a merry glow as he sloshed dark wine in toasts and well wishes to the engaged every now and again all through the night. _

_It had been a private supper with a few close noblemen and merchants that had been friends of the family since time immemorial. Laughter and glee gaily surrounded the laden table, all towards the soon to be married couple._

_Despite his previous displays of boorishness, Gaston was a perfect, nay even lovely gentleman to her. It was as though he were a different person from the coarse brute. As they dined upon roasted goose and vegetables, not a word of his vaunted trophies he speared in his lengthy hunts had crossed his lips and neither had a disapproving jest spat past his mouth. He sipped his wine sparingly and seemed to have a control that impressed and surprised the beauty all at once. _

His courtliness was indeed suspicious, to the point of almost acting, but still Belle reasoned with her never ending optimism, perhaps this was the beginnings of what was true love. Perhaps life was meant to work out with the knight where she would not dread to be married to him.

A large grin stole upon her lips as she twirled one last time perilously close to the hearth in her quarters. Oh but the drawing end of the night had been the apex of the fine evening.

_Bards and minstrels situated behind austere mauve curtains played low, sweet music, that trilled upon the warm air, soothed the soul and made the body wish to sway like a serpent enthralled by a tamers horn. Their wordless songs wrapped around the heart and brought to mind pleasantries of the mind. With the faint music wafting upon the currents she ingested the harmony and melody of lutes and strings made her nearly delirious with an odd happiness. _

_Gaston leaned over to whisper in her ear. "My lady, might I have the honor to escort you away for a while?" He asked lowly but respectfully. _

"_I…I suppose." She accepted anxiously and tenuously placed down her goblet. It was far from impropriety for him to ask and perhaps she would have been seen the rude one to decline him. _

_Like a perfect gentleman he gently took her delicate hand in his large battle calloused grip after the last of the wine was dredged from their crystal glasses and ferried her away from the empty dishes and older persons. About the tables, knowing grins donned the faces of all as they shooed the young couple away from the older folk saying the young needed their time alone and not to be bored to death by elder talk. _

_At first wary of the offer, she hesitatingly accepted while dreading whatever he had in mind for the evening alone. There were many things they could do which wouldn't lead to a talk of lust or scandal about the servants and then the townsmen, but most of those, Belle shied away from at present. Instead, she had been wondrously surprised at his utter propriety. _

_Gaston, while brutish at times seemed truly to be a different person as they strolled through the lavish keep of her ancestors. He hadn't plied his hand at getting her into a corner for a kiss, nor had he pawed at her as tenaciously as he had the day before. Despite his hulking form he was strode graceful wherever he trod. _

_Keeping his hand tight about her own, he led her up along the blue marble floor as though he had lived in the palace all his life and led a trail about the towering alabaster columns until they seemed lost in a cold forest of blue and white. Forever they seemed to roam the gilded halls until resting close by the largest stone pillar._

_Holding her hand he took a precious moment to stare into her lovely cerulean eyes. A battle worn hand brushed back a rebellious maple ringlet as he smiled softly down at her. _

_As she stared into his light blue depths she awaited the soul gushing feelings of complete adoration to engulf her. Now was the moment, or so tomes told, love would overflow from her heart as she would know clearly in her spirit what true love meant. It was supposed to be the moment when she realized the entire world was right and she loved him with every ounce of ardor one souls could claim and yet only a singular spark struck but for a hearts beat and died; leaving a coldness behind. The moment had not even hinted at her heart and they merely strolled together, enraptured in the soft tunes still drifting into nothingness upon the air. _

No, Belle frowned ponderously for a moment as she slipped off her night shift and garbed herself in her blue dress and tied the laces as always with out the aid of a servant; the swooning all encompassing moment had not arrived yet, at that time.

Oh but he did have his moments of charming that night, there was no denying that. Gaston had a way about women and she was never completely invulnerable to his charms.

_After the music fell away lightly upon the winds, he took her to a gray balcony overlooking the sprawling, well kept gardens of the palace below. _

_The labyrinth of green hedges and cedar trees cut to an arrows point made a swirling design through a path of white gravel that gleamed in the moonlight as though the trails were forged of silver star shards. _

_Under the ebony satin of night, the wild fields of copious stars, all agleam like bibelot gems, and a pallid slice of moon smiling above them, the moment almost felt magical in the cool, darkness wrought, and the ease the wine and good hearty laughter of dining with friends and family. _

_Yet she stared longingly past the spurting fountains and carved statuettes upon their pillars in the man made garden to the wild, untamed forest past the flat land. Darkness and peril clung to the wild forest edge amidst the tangle and undergrowth of bramble and thorn; a stark contrast to the neat beds of flowers and graven images of stone, and yet it felt safer, more wondrous than even a palace. Involuntarily, her mind fell to her sanctuary and where her heart truly yearned to be in freedom. _

"_I'm sorry for the day before."_ Belle recalled Gaston apologizing almost bitterly as they greedily took in the warm night and the lovely shadow the darkness wrought under the stars. His features had not seemed so twisted then under the stars, but looking back she recalled a smoldering fire like twin embers in his eyes.

_A slight snarl broke through the charming face he kept the entire night. "I know you did not approval the fight, but I wished only to impress you." He looked down almost bashfully. "Truth be told, I don't know how to really do that so I only did what I know best. I wanted to show you I was strong." _

_He sounded so utterly repentant and sincere she almost felt pity to him. Almost. _

_Silence drew on as they simply held hands and looked at the outside world together. After a time and perhaps to his frustration he bid her good night with a deeper kiss on the lips than normal. _

To Belle, he hadn't stunk of his normal reek, but still she felt her gut squirm uncomfortably and her mouth wish to pull away and gargle with scalding salt water. Still, even after the kiss it had still been a wondrous, magical night; one that left her with a tenuous hope for the future instead of abject dread.

"Oh missus, I heard about the night you had with your betrothed." Sarah jovially entered her mistress' quarters jabbering excitedly like the ever giggling ladies in waiting. Utter happiness crowned her ruddy face and dimpled cheeks like the glow of morn. Even the crimped curls under her blue mop cap seemed to have an extraordinary flounce with her bobbing step.

Her hands clasped a silver tray of breakfast as she chattered jubilantly. "The servants told me sir Gaston snuck you out after supper and the two of you stayed for a nice long while out on the balcony. Not doing anything unscrupulous, I hope." The maid added astutely.

A bashful smile tugged upon Belle's pink lips as though she were a caught servant girl with a coachman. "Gaston was a gentleman." She replied mildly as she neared to take up her tea cup and a buttery, steaming croissant beckoning her grumbling belly.

Sarah grinned knowingly as she slapped Belle's hand away from her morning meal, like she'd done when the girl could barely see over the table, until she laid out the spread properly. "That's more than you've said about him in a long while, and about time if'n you ask me, missus." She laid out the dishes carefully as she added more soberly. "Maybe you'll be spending your dinners up here rather than down with that…that monster."

"Rum!" Belle proclaimed in a startled surprise and slapped a hand to her forehead as her mind recalled the fiend lurking below them. "I forgot. I meant to have breakfast with him to make up for last night."

The maid servant frowned disapprovingly to her charge. "Oh now, child, when will all this foolishness be at an end? It is a Beast just as Gaston said, and you shouldn't be getting so close to It. You can feed a wolf all It's life and still it will bite you. Just because you think you have entire control, doesn't mean you actually do."

"Now Sarah I don't think he's a monster nor do I think my time with him is foolish." Belle reprimanded her life long friend and surrogate mother tenderly. Long since had passed her annoyance and confusion of Sarah's and all the townsmen wariness and dislike of her Rum. They would never understand, and she made peace with the saddened thought months ago though her heart ached to have them see him as only a crazed Beast meant to be chained.

Giving her guardian a daughterly kiss on the cheek she snapped up a piping hot croissant from behind her back as she raced for the door. She juggled the flaky pastry between her hands to ward off burns as she disappeared through the portal. "You eat breakfast, Sarah, I'll be down with Rum should anyone come looking for me."

Agitated, Sarah opened her mouth to protest and lecture her ward on the improprieties of slacking in her royal duty. That monster of hers seemed to always be coming first and if she were to inherit a kingdom that could not be allowed when measured with her people. Already she had given the nice boy Gaston a brain full of advice to help coax Belle away from the monster, as he had done last night, in hopes her missus would spend more time with her betrothed rather than the Beast, but still nothing dissuaded the child!

"Where did I go wrong with that girl?" Sarah frowned wryly as she fixed herself a spot of honeyed tea and a plate of breakfast. Shaking her graying head the servant lamented, through bites of croissants, for her determined charge and her stubbornness never to let things lie.

~8~8~

Golden thread glimmered like diamonds in the torches bickering flames of Rumpelstiltskin's lair. Guttering tongues of fire nestled in their sconces loomed over the Dark One akin to lidless eyes peering through his odd, glimmering gray-gold skin as he sat hunched over his wheel.

Spools upon heavy spools of gold rested in an oblong, straw basket by his feet; burdened heavily with the work of his wheel. Stray strands of gold that mortals would have warred over lay snaked about haphazardly and uncared for like topaz striations in the rock the base and around the wheel.

He hadn't spun so much since Bae had disappeared through the milky white eye of the portal, some part of him noted in the back of his mind that was not feverishly attuned to the wheels hypnotic cycle. Only dire occasions made him take to his spindles with such a zealous fervency and even now he felt as though spinning all the straw in the world would never be enough.

With each sharp creak of the wheel and a new inch of thread born from the tawny straw he pointed all his energy into forgetting the enthralling kindness of his mistress. Tenderness was poison he had allowed and even plotted to use against her! She herself was venom that needed to be eradicated from his mind as poison was siphoned from the blood!

But how could one drain thoughts from the mind? How did one balm a brain when she was branded upon his head and his every contemplation?

Hours of spinning had done nothing to mark a trace of her from his mind. Late in the night he had tried his hand at drinking her away, and yet even two kegs emptied of their swill drink availed him not!

His talons worked in rapid tempo as he lightly tugged the gold and spun the wheel at a devilish pace. The spokes were a brown blur as he forced the wheel to circle at an alarming rate and the spindles to wobble precariously on their needles.

Anything would be better than feeling the hurt he felt claw another mark on her heart. Anything would be preferred to having her on his mind even though he felt so much more the fool for allowing his guard to be down and letting her creep inside like a master thief that stole every other machination.

But spinning didn't help, he snarled in furious desperation inwardly as he forced the wheel to turn faster. Nothing short of a magic forgetfulness potion would cure his ill and even then the kris would not allow that!

"Rum!" Belle soft voice chimed suddenly throughout his lair setting his heart aflame, though not of his own volition. Even her melodious tone could cause his body to betray him!

Feather light steps trotted gaily upon the stone and echoed about him, but he did not dare stop to face her. Not that it mattered, he supposed sardonically as his lips transformed upon a thin line of anger; her image was still branded on the forefront of his mind like a portrait.

Grimacing darkly, his orbs harder than diamond, he stared intently at the wheel as though it would mutate into a dragon if he but glared icily enough. Why did she have to come and make his soul cry out in glee and agony all at once?

"What does the mistress desire?" Rumpelstiltskin asked in clipped tones, unable to keep the steel from his curt voice.

Belle paused taken aback by the frigid reception. The beauty placed the breakfast tray gently upon the cleaned slab as, her mind awhirl at his shortness. "Nothing, Rum. I brought us breakfast. I felt bad for missing dinner."

"I'm not hungry." The fiend supplied blandly as the creak of his wheel slowed to a lethargic pace.

Abandoning the tray on the normal slab they shared meals, the beauty cocked her head faintly to the right as she padded warily towards him as though he were some injured animal. "Is there something the matter?" She inched nearer cautiously, her hands drawn to her chest. "Are you angry with me for missing dinner?"

The creak of the wheel hesitated, his hands loosening their vice grip. The Dark One's head was barely turned in her general direction. "No." The fiend sighed dourly, his lips down turned in a deep frown. "I'm not angry with you." How could he ever be angry with her even when she skewered his heart and pinned it to the rock?

He was furious with himself; furious he had allowed her to burrow under his skin and now he could not push her out. His plots had made him act utterly obedient, but then he found himself far more easily doing things for her with without provocation and trying to please her on a capricious fancy.

Abruptly, her hand landed upon his leathered shoulder severing his thoughts as though she had yanked him back physically from repose. Maneuvering her way around to his front, the beauty lightly plucked up the thread from betwixt his numb talons and laid it aside.

Breath barely whispered from betwixt his lips as Belle plopped down on the edge of the large wheel. Her hand landed gently on his thigh in a tender touch.

Concern flashed in her gaze as she peered into his ebony depths without hatred or disgust or ever fear. "Will you tell me what's the matter?" She asked with the gentleness of an angel to soothe his tormented soul.

For a moment he nearly spilled his heart out. He nearly related the dinner and the warm expectation what thrived in his heart that had been thwarted and crushed. Yes, he nearly admitted he had been sad; the Dark One saddened that his owner hadn't come to eat with him.

Anger hummed with the heat of a roaring fire in his veins as the memories of the night resurged turning the embers of melancholy into an inferno of rage once more. How much of a fool he had been and now she thought to coax down his guard with a touch and soft words! Why did she have to be kind and instill life into emotions once dead! He was not her pet to be comforted and soothed so he could bare his heart!

Flames of fury roared in his chest and in turn alighting his blackened soul. Shooting up as though he hand and voice were poisonous serpents, he knocked the stool he sat upon back as he staggered backwards as though coming out of a trance.

"No!" Rumpelstiltskin shouted, feeling the monster within him surge to life and claw at his senses, begging to be unleashed. Jagged black and yellow teeth bared warningly as he sneered dangerously at the beauty. A sharp, black talon pointed to her accusingly. "I don't need your kindness, mistress; I don't need your false concern or your real pity for a monster." The Dark One motioned back to the door leading back to the upper levels of the castle. "Go back to your nobles and your betrothed! Leave your beast alone until you have a command you'd like performed!"

Perhaps if she showed she truly cared not for him, he could banish her from his mind and wipe the foolish notions from his heart. If she even showed an inkling she did not care, then he could overcome her poison splattered upon his heart.

"I'm only trying to help!" Belle reared with a fiery ferocity he rarely saw in his mistress. Indignation and fury glimmered in her azure depths as she stood up to face whim without a hint of fear. He seemed like a wounded wild beast in need of aid yet snapped at any who tried to tend his ills.

"Your help is hurt!" Rumpelstiltskin roared back with the beast that raged in him. Talons curled into fist, he all but shook in exploded fury. Words of the heart tumbled past his lips like a dam broken with the flood waters crashing free to wipe out the walls he had so fastidiously erected all his long centuries ago. "You wormed your way into my heart and with every opportunity you dig deeper! You are a taint upon me, I cannot scour clean no matter how hard I try to wipe you away! You look at me and I want to beg at your feet and ask what I can do to please the mistress for a touch, a simple touch of your hand! I see you when I spin, I see you in the dregs of mead and ale that have no effect of dispelling you from my thoughts. Somehow you cling to my skin, and I wish I could shake you off! If you go away, if you treated me like any other would, maybe I can succeed! But until you finally see what everyone else sees you will be festering in my heart, making me feel things I should not feel for one so lovely!"

With that, the fiend turned upon his heel and stomped away into the blackness of the inner caverns leaving Belle standing alone by his wheel, silent in shock at his outburst.

Perhaps he had opened his mouth and spewed out more than was good, but to announce to her what clawed at his heart seemed to alleviate the hurt somewhat. For the first time in months he felt he could breathe properly again, though the breath was still tight whenever her name flew to his lips.

Not caring what stood in his way, the fiend marched like a surly bull through a forest of stone spears that fanged the darkness. He could not leave the caverns, but the dungeons were vast enough for more than two people to be away. Sharpened edges of stone cut at him in his march to be away from her, but he cared not.

At once, he walked to close to a jagged edge of rock that sliced open his tunic, barely skimming his flesh. Irritated and enraged, the Dark One growled disconsolately as he flourished his talons repairing the ruined leather tunic with magic whilst walking deeper into the belly of the dungeon.

Chill wind cruelly nipped at the exposed flesh so deep below the surface, but he paid no more mind than he would have walking over an ant. Each bite of icy drafty whispers of air dug into his skin, and yet he relished the discomfort.

How he loathed to run, but running was all he knew.

"We aren't done here, Rumpelstiltskin!" Belle's voice fell from behind and resounded upon the fang-like pinnacles as she stumbled her way through the darkness in pursuit.

Even though the world was far darker deeper inside his lair she was far from given up.

"You can't run or try to forget your problems!" The beauty argued as she neared a glowing pool that radiated a faint hint of light.

Enraged beyond comprehension, Rumpelstiltskin twisted about to face her. Fury smoldered in his eyes as he stomped back toward her closing the gap. "Forgetting is just the problem, mistress." He snarled. At once his talon began to pluck the cords to his leather jerkin. "This is the source of all my troubles, why I hate you for what you do to me."

Fervor filled her heart as she began to retort. "You can't just-." A gasp fell from the beauty's lips as he jerked opened his tunic.

The dark brand across his heart showed clearly in the faint light and the glow from some magical orbs of light. 'Belle' sat etched upon his skin as though a blade had carved it in flesh. "I can't forget you." He explained sourly, almost desperately. "No matter how hard I try, you are literally engraved upon me. That is what is driving me mad; you are what's rearing up emotions that should have stayed dead."

For a moment her anger vanished into nothingness, his words no more than drabble that left her mind. "How…did…how…?" She stammered, her eyes glued to the word.

"You _own _me, mistress." The Dark One snarled lowly proffering a wiry talon to the mark. "In body and will. It is only fitting since you control the dagger with my name I have your name upon me. I told you we were bound. And this is the foundation of my problem. You stick to me, like this name, and I cannot be rid of you. I feel you in this mark. And maybe for another I could forget them, but not you so entwined with me; branded on me. "

Pain as though the wound had been carved upon her lined Belle's face. Tossing away all fury she neared him unconcerned of his blistering wrath, her eyes only for the marks. "It must hurt." Belle commented lowly, her finger lightly pressed against the outer art of the 'B' upon his chest.

"Not all the time." He admitted, his eyes still smoldering with the dark flames of anger and hatred. His heart hammered wildly in his chest at her touch that soothed and made him all the angrier. Her soft voice seemed to quell a hint of fire. " It hurts me very little since you have been a kinder master than most would have been to me."

"I would never be cruel to you." She promised in a solemn oath. The wail of wind and a steady plop into the pool were the only witness of her words. How could she ever even wish to be cruel to her Rum?

The fiend shook his head as though fighting the inner creature prowling his black heart. "But you are cruel." He swallowed and wrapped his ugly clawed hand about her delicate wrist. Her bones felt small in his grip as he held her firmly, but not uncomfortably. "Your kindness is my cruelty and light my soul abhors and needs all at once and I hate it, but I still want it. I know it burns, but I will allow it to burn me willingly and that is why your kindness hurts."

Blankly, Belle stared as his slowly heaving chest. "I don't want to hurt you. The last thing I ever wish to do is harm you." And yet, he told of pain and being hurt at her hands, by tenderness of all things. Was she so cruel as to make him suffer what he thought torment? Who was she to judge what he thought good and ill?

Silence reigned between them as they stood by the edge of the pool deep under the bustling castle above that labored and laughed unsuspectingly.

"Rum." She spoke his name in a half tenuous whisper as though she were calling out lowly. Licking her lips she refused to gaze into his sightless orbs as her heart bubbled with a question born of desperation to see him happy. "You know I would not intentionally make you miserable. I loathe the thought of seeing you harmed. I wish I could just disband the entire notion of your slavery and allow us to both depart unscathed."

Silence enthralled them for long minutes, until she worked up the nerve to speak once more. Her voice came low and tremulous as the words that came from the depths of her heart struggled up from her throat. "The first we met you said you'd slay me and my people if you got a hand to your dagger." The beauty looked down, unable to meet his ebony gaze. "What…what would you do if I freed you now?"

His scaled brow beetled ponderously as though he were searching for words. For once the dagger did compel him to speak and bring forth words he knew to be truth in the depths of his heart.

"I would bring ruin upon this little kingdom where nothing would survive." He began with the destruction of her kin as he had claimed in his first revelation. There were to many risks in anything otherwise.

Belle began to turn away, her heart worn and caught between the safety of her people and his freedom. How could she put her people's lives up just to see him free?

Abruptly he added in low tones. "But I would spare you."

The words came up with the compulsion of the blade that made him speak the entire truth. Warily his hand touched her cheek as she had once done. "I would steal you away." He whispered quietly, his head tilted down to her. "I would take you far, far away from this kingdom and to my home the Dark Castle so you could never tell another living soul about my weakness. I would make you my slave and command you tend to the meals and clean my home. I would give you a comfortable room in my castle so you would not feel too miserable with your captivity. I would bring you books from all about the known realms to please you and give you the dusty library on the second floor. I would keep you forever and treat you well and cherish you from afar as I do now."

That was all, he knew instinctively, all of what spewed from his black heart and stormed upon his soul for months. It was the knowledge he felt far differently for her now that he had so tenaciously tried to lock away and deny.

A knot of wariness and dread balled in his gut as he imagined the panic and disgust upon her adumbrated face. Surely death would be preferable than what he described as her fate. To be ripped from royalty into thralldom without any hope over ever escaping would seem a nightmare to most.

Presented at her feet, was laid what had festered like a sore in his heart. Part of him had long banished the thought of killing her. The darkness in him was in denial, the first moment she had demanded him be treated like a guest and not a slave. From then on she had grown on him to a point he could slay her as much as he could rip out his own throat.

But now she knew his heart and the feeling he had denied since their first meeting. Oh how he wished to shrivel away from her, ugly and foul as he was proclaiming his fondess for one such lovely as she!

Bracing himself, he felt at any moment her disgust would mutate into unadulterated horror of his claim. He imagined her pushing away in abject terror from him and running away into the arms of her betrothed, and yet she did not.

Amazingly, astoundingly, the fiend watched wide eyed as the beauty neared another inch instead of turning away and racing away from his grip. No words crossed the threshold of her lips as she came impossibly close to him. Confused that she would willingly near him in lieu of racing in away, Rumpelstiltskin watched in a numb fascination.

The books had never said it would happen in such a way, Belle knew as her fingers traced the gray-gold scales of his torso. Her heart was not supposed to swell with the feelings she should have felt for Gaston instead for her slave. The 'moment' of realization should have been under the stars with her betrothed as he stared deeply into her eyes, but it hadn't

Instead, her heart finally erupted for the one man who once threatened her with death and spat he hated her long ago. No book had ever written of that, nor song ever sung, and still it bloomed within her. But too know her Rum's heart, to know what had changed and seeded in his soul had alit the spark in her heart and instead of dying away, the flame brightened for him and him alone.

Her moves were naturally fluid, almost inspired, as she leaned into him upon an uncanny instinct and tenderly pressed a warm, soft kiss to the engraved flesh upon his chest.


	14. Thinking

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals! Hugs for all!_

**~8~8~**

Shock irrepressibly carved upon Rumpelstiltskin's gray-gold visage detailing his utter astonishment towards his mistress. Belle's soft, warm lips pressed against his bare flesh, her hands flush against his rapidly heating skin.

Breath hitched tightly in his throat as he felt as though his heart paused its eternal, rhythmic tempo. Light akin to that of a thousand suns burst into the Dark One's mind in a blinding display, making him wish to reel away with their intensity. Numbness iced over his body stilling the very blood in his veins with her one simple gesture that rocked the very foundation of his mind.

Magic aimed to subdue him or slay him had never come close to such a staggering effect as his mistress dealt upon him in that moment. Every scrap of power the fairies possessed could have been aimed towards him and he would have been powerless to conjure one ward to thwart them. Weakness engulfed him making the fiend feel elated and drained all in the same instance.

Her full wet lips felt wonderful against his hot skin, her softness a cool poultice against his ever scarred, bleeding heart. For a moment he could imagine his brokenness mended by her lips and transforming him back from monster to man.

His knees locked in order to keep aright as he allowed the healing of her kiss to ripple against his body that sent waves of strange feelings shivering through his ancient form. A soft, pleased chirp tumbled involuntarily from his mouth as he realized truly, his mind had not finally been severed from the sane world and he was not in delirious, happy madness.

Carefully, he tucked the astounding moment in the depths of his heart to remember for all eternity. Something he never thought would occur with a willing woman, or even a woman that could be paid for, happened before him.

His mistress actually possessed the raw audacity, by whatever incredible prompting inside her, to kiss him.

Releasing her mouth from his skin, the beauty's lips parted only a hair from his oddly skinned frame in well needed breath. Her indigo eyes darted searchingly as she stared against his handsome, glimmering flesh as though she was only truly seeing him for the first time and it was wonderful. He was wonderful.

His skin was truly different from anything she had touched before. Definitely, his odd skin was not soft and smooth as some milksop who never plied their hands at true labor, but it was a far cry from the roughness she assumed it . How long had she tried to determine was his flesh rough as dragon hide or smooth like any man but with just the look of serpent skin?

Emboldened by the pleasurable discovery, Belle dealt another tenuous peck of the lips higher upon his ridged skin. Her eyes shut in wondrous elation as with each inhale for the cold air she breathed in his musk of sickly sweet magic and sweat that clung to his flesh.

Lips of the softest satin vapidly inched up his prickling skin in sweet, exploratory kisses leaving a trail of her warm breath and a tingling sensation behind. Her bottom lip skimmed ever so slightly against him as though loathe to leave the last place she had pressed her mouth. Never in her life had Belle so pointedly felt the compunction to kiss another man and now that she had, wanting to kiss every inch of his body felt irresistible. She wished to know him on every level starting with his body.

In return, the beauty sensed the fiend lower his head against where her shoulder met her neck. Shivers thrilled exhilaratingly like frigid flames up and down her spine as his lips kissed the exposed crook of her neck warily. As his mouth gently, cautiously even, touched against her skin, she could feel his tremulous quaking beneath the kisses that set her blood aflame in her veins.

Butterfly's twirled in her somersaulting belly, pooling a fire inside her she had never known before. A desire, a fervent lust sprang with her bosom to allow him to kiss more of her, to simply be his in every way.

For a moment, the pair focused upon nothing more but holding one another skin to skin and allowing their lips to search their bodies and taste the other as though gathering a portion of them with each collision of flesh to mouth.

The Dark One's lips haphazardly peppered kisses against her neck and jaw and the shell of her ear and her cheek, savoring each meeting of flesh. Honey suckle perfume that wisped about her seemed to infuse with his kisses brining a sweetness to his lips far greater than any other he had known.

The beauty's mouth dabbed against his torso before kissing his jugular and tracing a swath of kisses against his chin.

Upwards and upwards in a coiling spire of exhilaration, they kissed, breath by breath they absorbed the other in gasps and inhales of their essence, till coming face to face.

Confusion and wonder and abject want glimmered brilliantly in Belle's azure depths with a look that bared the rawest of her soul. For the moment she felt no qualms knowing that he was hers and hers alone for as long as she held his blade to keep him enthralled.

Terror mingled with sheer delight danced behind the eyes of the Dark One making him seem so much more human and mortal. The way she looked upon him made his body yearn for her like no one had ever made him crave.

On instinct, the fiend leaned into her for a true kiss upon her lips, his body wishing with all his being to taste her properly. How long had he dreamt of the moment in his restless hours before stashing the thoughts back in the darkest corners of his mind? How long had he secretly desired to know if she, if anything, felt the glow that warmed his icy, stone soul and clutched at his heart?

Dipping closer, he sought to capture her lips at long last. His talons entangled into her thick, umber mane seeking to draw her closer.

Abruptly, a delicate hand pushed lightly against his tingling chest to halt his advance only inches away from his desire. The flat of her palm rested against the first place she had kissed his skin as though wiping the kiss away.

Feeling as though lightening had struck dead center in his torso, the Dark One reeled back a half step, the moment ruined. The small inkling that was still man inside him desired to taste her lips; too drink in her warmth until he was drunk upon her flavor.

Confusion flickered in his orbs in silent inquiry as his brow furrowed. Did she not want to be kissed? Did she not want to be lavished with words all but bursting from his heart?

Cowardice and fear Rumpelstiltskin knew all too well sparkled behind her sky blue eyes. The beauty nervously flicked away a curling lock of hair behind her ear as she shook her head. "I'm sorry, I don't know what I was thinking; I don't know what in the realms possessed me to do such a thing. I just don't…." She turned away unable to gather the proper words. If she had would she have even been able to utter them truthfully?

Rumpelstiltskin's voice was little more than a whisper in the dimly illumed dungeon. "You know what I've been feeling, don't you?" Fear or perhaps a wary hope tinged his voice. He cocked his head an inch to the left as though a different angle would peer straight through to her heart.

Her silence answered louder than any words could have.

"You have felt it as well." The fiend stated bolder, this time leaving no trace of a question.

There had never been more an astute estimation or guess in the entire world, Belle laughed mirthlessly in her thoughts. All he had described, all he had felt clawing at his most tender parts of soul with wanting talons had scored marks that could not be mended upon her heart as well.

"I'm engaged to be married, Rum." Belle shivered against the nip cold that bit at her skin and chilled the places where his warm lips once laid and ignited her flesh into a conflagration. His kisses felt like cold ash of a long dead fire against her skin. "I shouldn't, I can't I…."

"Belle." His spindly claws rested against her shoulder softly. She did know the urging that had laid upon his heart for she had been privy them as well, he knew without an inkling of doubt. She knew what torments plagued him for perhaps they had plagued her as well.

Silence listed about them at the simple moniker spoken into the low, shrieking wind. He never called her Belle. The Dark One rarely called one by their proper name. For her, she fell into the ranks he merely dubbed 'Dearie" or more commonly he acknowledged her as mistress, but never simply Belle. The word sounded so raw and imitate finally expressed past his lips it seemed almost the way one spoke in a prayer.

Darting away from his hand, the beauty shook her head uneasily, her mind trying to banish the way her heart leapt when he uttered her name. Tears brimmed the rim of her sapphire eyes as she turned away. A stoic will forced down the knot of tears as she spoke shakily. "I'm sorry. I need to think about all this, Rum. I just need to think."

"Of course, mistress." Rumpelstiltskin sighed acceptingly. He bowed his head obediently, more to veil his stirring emotions than for deference sake.

How was he to expect her too be so solid and sure of their new found emotions when he didn't even understand the simplest bit himself? They both found themselves in the midst of a raging ocean and neither was quite certain where or what the next wave of feelings would bring once crashed over their heads.

She of the two had the most to consider, he thought as her footsteps dulled and faded with every heart beat. It was she who had the most to lose now they had had let their masks fall free and reveal what lay inside their hearts.

A sob chocked from Belle's throat echoed about the stone points as the beauty sprinted away into the blackness. Her feet flew as though the three headed beast of Hades was nipping at her heels. Perhaps, she considered, that would have been better than a confused heart.

Torn with emotion, she raced through the dimness; wanting nothing more than to seek a way out from the dire encroaching darkness that made her feel his eyes upon through the ebony shroud and the hear his voice upon wind that carried his tittering chuckle.

Stumbling once, she ignored the bloody scrapes on her hands and the small sharp rocks, but raced up once more, not daring to halt her stride. Vibrant blood, like the tears she had subdued, dribbled from her scuffed hands.

Oh what had her heart gotten into?

~8~8~

Dark gray clouds harried on the pearly blue horizon as Belle slipped away from the extravagant gothic castle and the fiend who lurked beneath its gilded halls and plush chambers.

Thunder rumbled distantly in the bellies of the ever darkening clouds like a surly giant roamed above the skies telling the tales of a coming summer storm to feed the crops and bring relief to the sweltering heat the sun lashed down upon the trudging mortals.

Cooler wind swayed the verdant boughs of trees and roused dust from the streets that bellowed in little storms children dashed back and forth into; becoming visible one moment then vanished the next.

At other times, less confusing times, Belle would have gleefully stepped out of the shadow and the walls that cordoned off the palace from humbler folk and played with the children until warm rain and scolding mothers forced the little ones into the thresholds of their homes and under awnings away from the erratic weather. Now, however, she simply wished she could disappear into the whirling brown dust and never come out again.

Sprinting close to the gray walls, and out of sight of guards who peered at the ominous clouds with hands over their weather, scarred brows judging the severity of the storm and making bets, she was all but a shadow until working her way to the back of the keep.

Hardly anyone ever tread where she went now, when life's problems overwhelmed the fort of her tenacity. She came to this place when even her strong heart seemed ready to crumble like hovel walls battered by ogre fists.

A small rusted gate creaked noisily as Belle shoved upon the black iron portal against the gusting wind. The grass about the neat square bent their spears in one direction in will with the breath of the storm. The little patch og lawn desperately required trimming once more. Straggly weeds and flat patches of crab grass choked older crumbling edifices of gray stone that pockmarked the carpet of green.

A few fat droplets of rain began to patter down intermittently as Belle reached her destination. Falling to her knees in the tufts of limpid grass she let the tears falls with the rain.

Hallow eyes stared at the pointed headstone before her that was always kept tended and neat even if she did the labor herself. Sighing dourly Belle hung her head in admitted defeat to the troubles she had fought off so long that now threatened to drown her.

"Mama I don't know what to do." She spoke in a cracked whisper that was nearly drowned out by the boiling thunder and a lash of silver that licked across the black sky.

A sad smile twitched at the fringe of her lips as the rain dampened her dress and plastered her chestnut tresses to her skin. "I've told you about Rumpelstiltskin before; the man people think a beast. The man that…." That what, Belle pondered fitfully; the man she cared for, the man she found she truly did…? Banishing that particular thought away in a scrambling panic, she continued. "Rumpelstiltskin he…he summons these things inside me I've never felt. I kissed him today and it was a moment that shall never leave my memory. I wanted to laugh and sing and cry and scream for joy all at once, but I kissed him more, wishing I could never stop."

The chill rain began to fall harder as a bright crimson tint blushed beneath the pale of tears and gray curtains of rain. "He kissed me back, Mama and I could have thought life would have gone on forever had we simply remained as how we where. He could have asked me anything and I would have said yes. I've never known anything like this and it scares me Mama. He tried to kiss me on the lips, but I stopped him."

In some instinct bred deep in her soul, some part knew if their lips met then truly there would be no going back. Something or maybe everything would change in the longing heartbeat they chose to truly meet with their feelings bared. Perhaps the dagger had warned her, perhaps it was her conscious and honor to duty, but whatever pulled her away from his lips warned of that contact.

"My loyalty and heart should go to Gaston, but in all my life of knowing him I've never felt even a hint of what a few moments of Rum instilled in me." Belle ran a trembling rain slick hand through her drenched mane. "Am I wrong for feeling this affection for the Dark One, master of the dark arts? Am I wrong for not feeling these things for my betrothed? I try to think, to use reason, but these are questions only a heart can answer, not a mind. A thousand thoughts whirl in a thousand tiny twisters through my head and I have the answer too none. I cannot go to Sarah; I dare not go to Papa; only you would understand, Mama."

Her voice softened as she placed her injured hand on the cold, wetted marble. "You would know the answers." She whispered brokenly to the cold stone as another mourning sigh twitched at her lips. "I know you would."

The cool summer rain that drove away the relentless heat from the unblinking orb pattered down in steady veils of gray wet whilst she talked to the grave. Leaning her back to the stone, Belle poured her heart out like the water that drained from the pregnant clouds until her words infused into the earth with the rain.

The stone remained silent and cold, but still, she felt as though her mother had been listening as she always had done before she had passed. So long did she outpour her soul, the summer shower had drained all its fury.

Blazing rays of sun pierced through the storm like heralds of the end of a war. Black clouds shredded into thin wisps, which slithered on their way, to allow the azure firmament to engulf the skies.

As the rain washed the heated earth and cobblestone clean so too did her soul feel sluiced cleaned.

Honeyed shafts of light beamed against the wet earth sending milky vapors into the air to dance with the rising heat. Mist arose from the wet to stream back into the atmosphere where it had only just hailed. The earth smelled of damp and dirt and cleaning of a fresh start, something the brown haired beauty sorely needed.

No miracle answer had struck her, but at least she felt the pressure upon her heart alleviate with the lighting clouds.

Wet and trembling, Belle arose solemnly from her mother's grave. There was no one quite like a mother to come to your problems.

Refreshed of body and soul, the beauty hiked up her dirt stained, sopped dress as she returned the way she came to the castle, feeling rejuvenated and strong once more.

~8~8~

In the darkness of his cold lair, away from rain or his troubled mistress, Rumpelstiltskin sat ponderously at his wheel for lack of anything better to do.

His ebony orbs glued to the wooden spoke that lay stilled from their eternal cycle. Eerie whispers of the wind filled his ears instead of the shriek of the wheel that would have normally soothed him and granted him a gateway to his deepest contemplations.

Now, he knew imperatively, after what had transpired between mistress and slave, spinning would be all but useless. There was no inkling of hope he could even remotely forget the heat of her mouth and the warmth of her breath skirting his skin.

She had kissed him; the Dark One could not ever erase that thought from his mind even if he spun for a thousand years. Thoughtlessly, his dexterous talons encircled the area upon his chest where she had first pressed her lips against him. The area still had not stopped tingling where she first expressed his pent up emotions were not simply one-sided.

Milah was the last woman to ever show him such affection, and those moments of love ceased the day he came back limping like a beaten dog from the warfront. Hatred and enmity and bitterness to being strapped with the town coward replaced the fragile love for one another she had forged.

He had never felt with Milah even when they were happy what came so naturally with Belle. He had learned to cherish Milah, but with Belle, affection came easier than drawing breath or harnessing magic. Cherishing Belle felt a part of him and seemed more inate that his natural instincts.

Wonderment instilled in his black blood whenever the thought that she had truly, of her own volition kissed him, sprang to his mind. Willingly she had chosen to kiss him. Her face had not twisted in revulsion nor had she turned green with ill to know she had laid her lush mouth against the dragon flesh of a monster.

Why had she done it was the biggest conundrum of them all. What would possess her to kiss him and what had possessed him to return the mortal means of affection? True, he did lust for her, but never had he allowed his fancies to even potentially cross paths that could lead endangering. But in those few precious moments he had abounded all plans. With each kiss there was no Snow White or Regina, only Belle, lovely, beautiful Belle.

Abruptly, the door to his lair creaked open heralding his mistress had once again returned to face him. Tension crackled like lightening against his skin as he rose mechanically and turned, his body rigid with wariness.

The last time nerves grappled with him so terrible was when he had lifted the mace far over his head to do the deed of self maiming that would keep him alive and be with his son and wife. Would this moment of indecision and anxiousness end with tragedy as well?

Her face was smooth and peaceful unlike the last time he saw her where she had looked nothing of herself. Rain dripped from her dress into a pool of the floor, but he had never seen her so serene. Fear and uncertainty were bereft of her features and even the air about her seemed to radiate with her Belle-like confidence.

Steeping only inches away, the beauty's shoulders heaved as she sighed quietly. Hands clasped in front of her rain wetted dress she stared up into his midnight orbs silently. If the moaning wind chilled her wet body she never allowed a hint of discomfort to mar her face.

"So what happens now, my mistress?" He queried breathlessly, his heart leaping like a wild salmon in his chest. What would be her recourse now that she had opened her heart just as he had opened his?

The beauty's slender arms wrapped about his body tighter than any chain could have ever held him. Lush pink lips hungrily pressed against his collar bone in greedy, life saving kisses that set his blood into an inferno once more. Even after the first time of her body touching his, he felt shock overwhelm him in a tidal wave of force that made him helpless.

"Honestly, I don't know." Belle whispered hoarsely as she nipped at the edge of his jaw with eager kisses that belayed her wanting. For all her intelligence, for all her reasoning and logic, the answers could not be found; not yet.

She wouldn't kiss him on the mouth just yet; not until she could properly work out her maze of tumultuous emotions flaring throughout her soul and thoughts of duty and honor and affection between her Rum and Gaston. But until then….

Belle smiled into a kiss against his shoulder that caused him to shudder. In return the fiend pressed his mouth against her thundering pulse.

Until she could decided what to do with the emotions and the whole mess sprawled out before her, there were by far many other places to kiss and she wished to try them all.


	15. Warring Hearts

A lively spring infused Gaston's thundering, black booted steps as he rambled down the gilt halls of Maurice's lavish palace. Normally, when not making plans with the veritable army of cooks and seamstresses and tailors and carpenters with his betrothed for their nuptials, he took his leisure roaming the keep or the sprawling entanglement of the king forest that would one day rightfully belong to him and all who tread upon its soil.

At other times that did not demand his attention with the marital plans, the knight traipsed about looking for courtiers who were rarely tightfisted in their flamboyant spending habits or spending his days languishing in splendor and quaffing ale or seeking out any voluptuous maids without too many scruples and a quiet tongues to keep rather unsavory things from being uttered back to the royal household.

Yes, under normal circumstances he would have freely surrendered himself to such enjoyable vices, but presently he was on a mission. Like any good warrior he knew when times for ease were placed aside to allow moments of action to be in their stead that would benefit him later.

A broad smile weaseled upon his ruggedly handsome features as he allowed the richness of the once floundering kingdom to permeate his being and instill grandiose thoughts of gross wealth that was only inches from his fingertips like plump fruit dangling low from the boughs awaiting to be plucked.

Finely crafted porcelain vases of ancient eras, bought with the Dark One's golden thread, sat in their stone alcoves and colorful tapestries stitched by the most skilled fingers in all the land dressed the cold stone walls. Luxury and ornament graced every niche from plush corridors to even the servant's blue and gold livery which looked better than most clothes the normal peasantry owned.

And it would all be his someday.

Gaston rumbled a deep, hearty chuckle and beamed exuberantly with the thrilling thought.

Though he was no fan of the ostentatious décor the graying king's taste deemed fashionable there was nothing hallways lined with his stuffed trophies and redecorated banquet hall where he would entertain guest wouldn't solve. Once Belle, the most beautiful woman in a thousand leagues, was finally wedded to himself stark changes would be made indeed!

He would rename the gothic citadel the Huntsman's Hall and begin to breed a savage army from the ranks of serfs and peasants and peaceful merchants. Blood and the calluses of war would grace their hand in favor of grips forged from picks and shovels and gesturing goods to buyers. Given time to hone their learned skills, they would become famed through all the realms and make those caught in their sights quake in terror of their coming.

His nation would disband the notion of a little peaceful kingdom nestled by the sluggish waters and transform into a mercenary realm that would never be beholden to another and earn their coins in battle instead of in vulnerable fields that any sizable army with an eye out for easy conquest could ravage. They would spit in the eye of all who dared to conquer them or think them lesser simply because of their size and the humbler reputation of the past.

Never again would they seem like the plump, well fed goose awaiting to be plucked, never again would he live through the terrifying nightmare that was the ogre siege as many called the dark time that plagued their kingdom, and never again would he have to stare in disgust at the injured, ill fed outriders galloping away on skinny, knobby kneed mares with letters to the high queen begging piteously for aid.

With the Dark One they would never toss and turn in their beds in trepidation of an attack from others who sought their riches and would command tribute and fealty from those nearest them who would covet their wealth.

With him as their courageous, benevolent leader his people would always be safe and he would be hailed as a brilliant king who led his people to war and filled their purses with coins.

The Beast Belle captured would of course be the center of his machinations conjuring weapons and potions and everything a lofty king would need in his reign. And when the dreadful creature wasn't forging things for the realm, he would be chained to his wheel making coils of gold!

Laughing brusquely at the happy thoughts teeming through his mind, Gaston made his way down a more simply adorned hall with necessities mingled with a humble taste of one born of good fortune but little more. Here there was nary a sign of rare extravagance that detailed a princess walked the halls.

Belle's quarter of the castle was a stark difference to the gaudy decoration of her fathers liking that filled the keep. The chambers Belle usually inhabited were night and day to the rest of the stronghold and to most noble houses.

Simple made runners and a few tasteful pieces dotted the halls. Homelike warmth seemed to radiate from the barren walls as though Belle had truly integrated her Belle-ness into the chambers and brightly lit corridors.

Servant girls who tended her portion of the keep could never be wooed or seduced in coupling with him. Many were wholly loyal to the princess and none dared start trouble betwixt the two to be wed.

A distasteful scowl pulled across his handsome visage troublingly. Why did a princess choose to live in such humbler conditions rather than the luxury of her exalted station? Below them was a beast who could grant her every desire and yet she asked for little.

Belle had always been an odd one, Gaston conceded with a faint touch of an outward nod as he traversed the halls. Even at a young age her head was stuck in musty books instead of the clay powder and rouge brought from the sea traders.

While other girls of her age begged and bawled at their parents for the most recent fanciful clothes of sewn petticoats and lace and the widest hooped skirts and shoes and fans and paint's for their faces, Belle only implored her father for books when a few traveling merchants came to town in their rickety carts with a handful of tomes among the rest of their junk.

While the childish girls grew into tittering young ladies, fine of face and dainty of manner, who dreamed of attending the grand balls of king Leopold and befriending the crown princess Snow White, Belle wondered how large the libraries were in the grandest kingdom of them all or looked out to the sluggish river at the disembarking caravels that were heading to the sea as though wishing she could stowaway and join them.

A young Gaston, forced to spend time with his betrothed as a youngling and a strapping young man caught between adulthood and child had tried to understand his wife to be in those strange times of youth when he was just beginning to see girls as more than weaklings that despised the rough housing of males. Truly he had tried to wrap his head about books and numbers that she tried to explain, but books made him angry and mathematics made his head whirl. Swords and shields were his away and he loathed any other.

How could she lose an entire day flipping worn yellowed pages and never bemoan such a thing? Half of the tomes did not even include pictures and yet she enjoyed what was normally scribes duties and messengers jobs!

The day Belle a young had punched Gaston in the shoulder because he had ruined her favorite book in attempts to force her mind away from the nonsense of learning was the day he had given up trying to understand her. He remembered seeing rage line her beauteous features as she gathered the wetted pages from the mud and wiped them off to no avail. A book was a book and he was confused why she would be upset. All he was trying to do was help her see what was important. He didn't want a wife that was whispered to be odd; such talk made heads rolls and he had gotten into many a scuffle with boys who called Belle 'oddball'.

Without books she could spend more time with him and fawn over his hunting skills and people would stop calling her odd behind her back, but that had never occurred.

For women as a whole, he prided himself on knowing them like he knew the trails of deer's and the marking of bears and for Belle it should have been no different. Should.

Females were hapless, brainless creatures who dreamt only of romance and the strong arms of a man who could make them feel secure. But Belle was a rare creature, different and puzzling, a freak of nature where she went against the flow of noble womanhood that surrounded their way of life.

Perhaps, he noted sagely as he stroked his shaved jaw, he would have truly pursued in knowing her if she had not already been given to him. Hunting, even if the hunt was to ensnare a woman with a net of charm instead of rope and hooks, was a past time he adored. But what challenge was there to find her weakness that would make her his when she was already bagged and awaiting for the day the clerics joined them as one?

Regrettably he had never found much incentive to pursue the beauty, lovely as she was, nor had he truly wished too other than brief when she truly intrigued him like a strange new animal before he killed it and had the thing stuffed and put on display.

Oh but she was gorgeous. If nothing else she would make a beautiful wife to stand at his side to the envy of all who stepped into his hall. Abruptly, he chuckled at a strange thought as he turned a corner. Yes she was outstandingly beautiful, but if a disease suddenly struck her forever mute, he wouldn't have had any quarrels with such a lucky stroke of good fortune.

Mulling pleasantly over the thought, his sharp eyes fell upon the tiny figure he had started off to seek.

"Miss Sarah Potts, just the woman I was looking to find." Gaston hailed suddenly as the tiny corpulent woman harried down the humble halls. A charming grin donned his lips as he finally intersected the plump maid he had begun his venture to seek.

A light green calico dress attired her cheery, rotund form in a grandmotherly fashion. Her matching green bonnet veered only slightly from its normal perfection silently telling the tale of a busy morning.

Sarah was forever loyal to her late mistress' daughter, but she was also a firm believer in tradition and the ways of nobles. All the bards tales of ladies falling in love with peasant men with stout hearts or brave knights gallivanting off to carry away hard working servant girls and milk maids were mere drabble and fool drivel to the no nonsense Sarah.

Nobles married those of their pedigree and peasants married their kind and so on for all in the world. Differences of rank only caused hassle and matrimonial strife as far as she was concerned.

To Potts love was not forged by destiny or fate but learned and cultivated like a precious flower. True Love, if it even existed to her, was a wild, erratic thing that had no meaning for one such as her who lived in a word were things were only black and white with no in-between.

A pink blush merrily dappled the portly servant's dimpled cheeks. Dipping an expert curtsey forged of years of servitude, the maid hefted a silver platter burdened with luncheon in one work hardened hand. "Sir Gaston, come to call upon the missus I wager?" The words came out almost in a sigh of disparagement.

"Actually, I was wondering did she say anything about me after out dinner a few nights ago?" He drawled lazily and flashed another dazzling grin to hide his eager curiosity. Tucking his thumbs into the top of his belt he exuded a gentlemanly curiosity of a courting man come to call upon his lady.

Sarah shrugged and shifted the tray from her hand to the next somewhat nervously. Delicate pudgy fingers plucked anxiously at her matching green shawl in bashful attitude. "Oh in not so many words, sir, but she has been absolutely radiant since that night." The maid sighed proudly, a soft, fond grin playing upon her lips before dying away in a crumbling heap of worry. "You should have seen her, Sir, twirling about and humming to herself. Some times I caught her simply sighing and staring out into nothing. Quite smitten if I do say so myself." She preened happily in assurance to the knight.

She wouldn't tell him of the troubling contemplations she took far too often now. In her mind there was no need to relate her charges worries over to her husband to be. Whatever was bothering her would soon be figured out.

Forcing himself not to breath a relived bellow of air, Gaston reveled inwardly at his expert charm that would subdue any female. "The credit goes to you, Sarah. Your advice was in disposable and gave me a boon I would never have had that night to sweep her off her feet."

"You're too kind, sir." Sarah blushed fiercely like a young girl in her prime again. "Oh but there is so much more to know than the little information I hinted to you. I know people might think the missus a strange lass, but she truly is a wonder once you get to know her."

The knight bowed deeply courteous to the head maidservant of the beauty. "Perhaps I may hear of those things at another time?" He inquired carefully as though trekking through a swamp riddled with pits of quicksand.

If Belle's guardian thought him to forthcoming and demanding for information on her mistress her alarms would be raised to protect her charge. Nothing would halt her from trying to veer away any ill from her ward, not even himself.

"I can tell you now." Sarah laid the gilded tray upon a clothed edge on a nearby marble pedestal. Lugubrious worry pointedly etched her aging, plump features in engraved lines upon her aging visage. Leaning conspiratorially to the knight, her voice was little more than a clandestine whisper. "Not that the missus will be up to receive luncheon. I only take up a meal now in the hope that she will be there." Her mouth skewed almost bitterly.

Producing a frilly laced cream colored handkerchief she dabbed her sweat slicked face delicately before continuing. "Been spending far too much time with that monster nowadays if you as me, Sir. Every time I turn around the girl is spending a spare moment down in its icy, horrid lair! I had hoped she would be up to eat, but I know in my heart she aint. She's always down with it now, forgetting her own people. I tell you, 'tis not proper for a lady of her pedigree and I won't be having it from the missus. The lady is not a silly young lass any longer free to do whatever she will. She has responsibility she is forgoing by being with that…that thing. I'll tell you everything if you can draw her away from that animal and set her away from the Beast!"

~8~8~

"And you put your hands here and here." Rumpelstiltskin explained gently in a quiet timbre to his endearing mistress.

Cold wind wailed hollowly like beseeching cries of the long dead and damned about the pair. The torrid heat from the world above made the caverns a cool hideaway from the relentless sun bearing down upon the backs of those who labored and sweated in the blistering haze.

The pair sat in front of the large, ancient wheel he focused so much of his time upon in his attempts to forget his wrongs of the past. Belle sat upon the low wooden stool, whilst the fiend loomed akin to a scrawny shadow behind his owner.

Coarse grayish wool instead of the heaps of tawny straw rested in the wicker basket next to the loom awaiting to be spun. A single frayed thread that hailed form the basket was entwined with the workings of the wheel just as it had been before he became the Dark One and spinning was his only means to make a few coins to support him and his boy.

Flawless brow beetled into thin ponderous lines of concentration, Belle stared determinedly at the rough grain of the spinners tool with a dogged intensity. "Here…?" She inquired warily as she placed her hands gently upon the age old wood.

"No, no." Laughed the fiend gently in reply, his amusement almost humanly sounding instead of his normally tittering giggles. More now, in the past few days, he found himself not taking on the careless falsetto chirp he had used so long.

"Here." He offered softly, wanting to show instead of merely explain. Arms snaked around her body to encircle her slender frame. The Dark One curled his wiry talons over her wrists gently in the lightest of touches. His voice glided across her ear from behind as he whispered. "Let me show you properly, mistress."

Warmth sparked involuntarily in the beauty towards his expert directing touch. Her pulse thundered like wild galloping horses beneath his scaled hands as he maneuvered her placement against the wheel.

While he, Belle knew, enjoyed the long bereft touch of another, she herself found him being near and searching her body as far as he dare with his exploring fingertips a rather addicting sensation. Every drag of his nails lightly across her flesh, his skin close to her own, and even the warmth of his breath dancing across her body, was a novel sensation that nearly had her pleaded for more.

Banishing the highly abhorrent thought of improprieties that stemmed from his touch, the beauty focused her azure gaze away from his talons and his body pressed behind her and back to the wheel and his lesson.

He placed her left hands on the uppermost rim of the wheel and the right on the lowest end near her knee. "You turn the wheel with the uppermost spoke to get the longest rotation and you pull the thread out gently but tightly on the other end to prevent snapping or entangling or bunching." Rumpelstiltskin explained easily as though it were common knowledge.

"Right." Belle nodded understandingly, her eyes focused as she absorbed the lesson. "And now I turn the wheel, correct?"

The Dark One merely nodded in attestation to her reply. Merriment glimmered in his voided ebony eyes as he released her dainty hands that preciously fluttered over his odd skin some days, when neither could resist the other, and stepped back to watch her first attempt.

Inhaling deeply, the beauty began to turn the wheel as she had seen him do many a time. How hard could spinning be? That was the thought that enthralled her when she entreated him to teach her the art. In reply he merely laughed and agreed to give her a lesson.

The creak of the wheel shrieked with every slow movement in protest to its mishandling at her grasp. Twined wool pinched between her right thumb and index finger came out in a horrid line. Little bumps of knotted wool and frayed, coarse lengths slithered out with each vapid, half tugged, turn for the wheel.

A grimace marked the beauty's face as she halted the cycle of the wheel. Hands in her lap she stared curiously at the more nest than thread she produced. "I don't understand, why did it come out in a jumble like that?" None of the gold he conjured from stalks of straw ever came out as rats bedding.

"I told you it was harder than it looks." The fiend laughed, his tone more of the Dark One than of the humanness it once bore.

Belle tossed her head in confusion. "But my hands were correct and the string came out steady."

Rumpelstiltskin nodded as he neared her once more. "Indeed you did, but there is one more important above all else."

Kneeling he gathered the jackdaws nest in his hands. The fibers that hand been somehow twined together began to unwind in his clawed grip. "You see the wheel requires balance. You cannot turn too fast or too slow just as you cannot work the thread out to hard nor to soft. They must work in tandem to achieve their goal. Had we put the thread upon the spindle you could have entangled the entire process with the extra step."

"I don't think I could ever do this properly." She gave a dour, cursory poke to the mass of wool that looked as much as it had before she plied her hand at the wheel.

A faint smile traced the fiend's lips. "All spinning takes is practice. You'll be an expert in no time."

Sharp pain stabbed like a dirks razor tip in his heart at the gently uttered words. His ancient mind remembered explaining the same to his young Bae when he wished to be just like his Papa in a time before he knew his father was a miserable coward. The young lad, with an un-tamable thatch of light brown curls that constantly fell in the way of his eyes would sit playing at his father's empty wheel pretending to make cloth for kings and nobles until his father taught him the art of spinning.

"Have you spun for a long time?" Belle queried cautiously. Though she was curious of his life before becoming her slave she did not wish to pry where she had no business. Misery deeply scored his face she read keenly as any book cover and though she was hesitant to ask, perhaps there was a way to uplift him.

"Longer than you can fathom." He admitted dourly. Melancholy traced his gray-gold features with an age old sadness bred in him for centuries. Dexterous black claws drummed against the wood in a steady rhythm as though touching the wheel gave him assurance of a memory.

One of the first things he had ever done with his new found gifts was making this wheel turn straw into gold. Back long, horrid centuries ago when he was but an amazed novice with his new found power, he had thought so foolishly small in the way of his curse that grafted toad skin to his form. Still his mind was focused on the simple things that surrounded his peasant life and nothing that equated the grandeur he could accumulate with but a thought.

Often he had dreamed of turning anything he desired into gold and he had enchanted the wheel so that it transmuted the most common place resource in the life's of drudges and serfs and peasants into a means of wealth - straw.

When Bae was still with him, he had never dreamt of castles filled with bibelot's and trinkets and baubles. All he had wanted was to be well off and happy with Bae and for them never to go hungry or need anything. Was that so wrong to want for a man was on the verge of poverty?

For centuries after his son was no more, he had filled his pitiful, lonely life with treasures and entertained himself with dallying in the life's of mortals. He had every extravagance he wished and yet he still found himself drawn to labor upon the wheel that once meant life or death for he and his son.

"Then I think I truly will become good at this, since I am learning from the master spinner." Belle observed kindly, her voice a buoy to lift him out of his murky slough. Who knows?" Good natured jest laced her tone as she smiled. "Perhaps one day I will be able to spin straw into gold."

"That, mistress." He paused for a moment and grunted as he rose and placed the wool back in the basket. "Is a very long ways off."

A sad smile crossed Belle's lips as the Dark One gentlemanly assisted her up. "I do wish I could stay longer." She remarked sullenly, loathing to leave him just when they were getting to know one another a little better. "Sarah is already raising cain that I'm spending more time as it is down here."

She hadn't meant to. Heaven only knew she hadn't meant to spend more time with her Rum, and even try to avoid his lair, but she found herself drawn like a moth to the dancing candles flame mesmerizing its victim with its tempting brilliance.

"Perhaps you should stay away for a few days." Rumpelstiltskin suggested with a nonchalant shrug that masked the twinge of hurt. "I don't want you getting in trouble on my account, mistress. Or you could merely utter the word and I will silence all their tongues so you may never have to hear their disapproval again."

Annoyance flashed in her sapphire eyes at the remark telling the fiend he had said the wrong thing. But what could he say when she was displeased? He wanted to grant her everything she wished and by any means.

Smoothing her light cotton garment, she shook her head staunchly. "You know I won't have that, Rum." Belle scolded mildly.

"Then I suppose we'll just have to be creative going behind your dear betroths back." The fiend cackled impishly, his devious wit rearing once more with the sudden surge of beastliness he felt pulse within.

Sighing, Belle tossed her head negatively. Most of the time she found she could subdue the unrest that stemmed from her intrigue for the Dark One in her heart, but there were instances when he made what they were doing profoundly clear. She didn't want to go behind Gaston's back, but neither did she wish to halt her exploratory feelings for her Rum.

Shame struck the Dark One for speaking such words. Torment and indecision marred her graceful visage, testament to the pain of a conflicted heart that battled barbarically inside her. "Forgive me." He muttered lowly at last. Averting his gaze he focused on the cold dark brown rock beneath his feet. "I shouldn't have said that."

"No, you should have." She protested stoically with a dour sigh. "I can't sweep these things under a rug and pretend their not issues. I…we have to figure this out. Some how…."

"What is there to figure out?" He stepped nearer, his obsidian eyes dancing with a strange glint that made her belly twirl and intrigue to whip into a blaze. Claws ghosted lightly against her cheek as he cocked his head slightly to the side. "I know I like to kiss you. I know I like how you feel in my arms when I hold you. I know I like how you smell and how your skin tastes."

A gentle smile traced her lips as she all but fell into his searching arms. Her head rested against his chest as his lanky arms encircled her form. "I like those things as well." The beauty admitted freely. Abruptly, the smile crumbled quicker than it came. "But it's so much more difficult than that."

A sigh tumbled plaintively past her lips as she pulled away. Kissing him tenuously upon the cheek she whispered into his ear. "I'll try to make it tomorrow, but chances are Sarah will probably hog tie my hands and feet rather than let me come down any earlier than usual."

With that, Belle began her venture back to the word above and away from the man who sparked feelings she had never conceived inside her. Going away was always difficult, but utterly necessary.

Cold wind carried her light steps through the fanged dungeon leaving the Dark One once again alone with his machinations.

What more was there to figure out, he contemplated furiously. She enjoyed his company and being near. Did she have an inkling of feeling for her betrothed? Did he still pose a threat to vie for her affection?

Cursing the name of Gaston rabidly, the fiend plopped down hard at his wheel. His black tipped fingers worked in studious labor upon the coarse wool as his mind roamed how to make Belle completely true to him and him alone. Even though he found his feelings to be new and wild and strange that did not overshadow the fact he still needed his freedom and needed to put in motion the final stages of his plots.

He would not, could not, let his plots go to waste simply of some woman who enthralled him so and dredged up foreign and dead emotions from the crypts of his heart.

Somehow, if he could completely have her affection and manage to wrangle the blade from her in the process then he could come out of his slavery barely scathed and with far more than he had entered.

Should everything go right he could come out with the accursed kris back in his clawed possession and a lovely young woman by his side in his eternal quest for the son he had lost.


	16. The Hunt Awry

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals. On an off note, for those who saw last night episode, did it have anyone else on edge the entire time? _

**~8~8~**

Clarion calls bellowed from gleaming hunter's horns through the misty morn in the king's forest. Their pure, sonorous tones belted over the land as though imperiously proclaiming the earth nobles tread upon the damp soil.

The golden orb of day, still barely aloft in its azure perch, was fastidiously barricaded behind a veil of wispy gray clouds. Glimmering droplets of dew, like the purest of diamonds, dampened the limpid blades of grass and reaching fronds about the rolling emerald plains and the perilous fringe of the tangled forest land.

Fog arisen from a late night rain and the heat of the earth wreathed the trees in their opaque shrouds of opaque white. All about the land vapors clung thick as winter blankets piled one atop the other. Rolling hills that stretched on for leagues and tangled branches that jutted from the dark woodland fringe were adumbrated within the milky mist.

The air was mild but hinted of the humid balminess that would cling to earth when the sun rose to its apex in the firmament. Already the air seemed heavy with moisture and made the chill that slightly suffused the earth turn into an uncomfortable warmth that plastered clothes to skin and made breathing laborious.

In the moderately cool morning, a veritable army of well to do tradesmen and nobles padded along parallel to the dark forest brim. With men of noble stock chatting away and tittering ladies dozing in their saddles or whispering and casting fetching, surreptitious glances behind lacy fans, along with the entire array of attendants, the company looked more akin to a strange, wandering party trying to find the perfect spot to break out a morning picnic.

Ladies that dotted the court or came from their own ruling fiefdoms that pockmarked the land rode along to spur on their champions and squeal and swoon when the dogs were released and the men leapt into action with bows and spears.

Tittering ninnies the lot of them, Belle often thought with annoyance, but today she could have no room to frown upon them for she was in the same position as them.

Belle stifled a large yawn behind her white gloved hand as she rode Philippe full saddle like the men astride their palomino's and chargers about her.

Much to the dedicated Sarah's chagrin, who piously claimed all proper ladies needed to ride side saddle at slow cantering paces that proclaimed their regal air, Belle rode as fine as the men about her. At times the troubled servant motioned a plump, wrinkling hand far behind them to make her case of her mistress' deviation of propriety and show the fine example of the women far behind that rode at a languorous, almost dainty plod with vassals leading their horses.

The beauty's gaping yawn was certainly not for the early hours she found herself briskly trotting along in the sleepy retinue of chatting hunters and noble women and yipping hounds, for she was accustomed to much early hours, but more of the tedium of the hunt she abhorred and the incessant droning of her betrothed.

Gentleman or not, when one inquired to Gaston, the most famed hunter in all the realm, even a brief, cursory question on the subject of prey, the inquirer was fatefully bound to be occupied with the fetters of harrowing tales of his lengthy hunts and his magnificent kills he had struck to the beasts in his paths and all the little arts that went along with his 'past time' as he liked to proclaim his jaunts through the forest with his arrows and spears and blood thirsty war hounds.

Late in the evening the previous day, Sarah had told of her betroths behest to accompany him on the hunt he was to have in her honor. They were to track down a surly boar menacing and churning up the farmers lands in search of truffles and bring back the slain monstrosity for a feast.

Between Sarah, her Papa, and Gaston, Belle found herself with little choice but to smile and nod and agree though her heart sank at the prospect. Indeed, she understood the reasons of putting down dangerous beasts that stalked their fields and killed the innocent, but why make such sport of it? Was their truly a need to heft it high above their heads and boast of their deeds with arrows and blades and leap about their prey like their ancestors of old?

At supper she had asked, nay, nearly pleaded with her Rum if he would like to accompany her on the venture that was sure to end gorily with some poor speared fellow too slow to move from the way of a sword tusk or a morbid display of blood and guts. With him about at least she would have been able to moderately tolerate the early rise out into the land to watch bowmen and falconers and foresters track down sleepy animals to bring down and stuff to place in their rugged hunting halls and manors.

Per usual he had declined, but not before at least claiming, if just to give her a spec of hope, he would think of the matter and would join her if he changed his mind.

Disappoint welled in her as the company took off in the pearl gray of dawn and he was nowhere to be found. With every shifting shadow and wisp of fog she wished him to appear from the vapors and join their band, and yet he did not walk through the darkness to ride at her side.

Still, she had surmised sullenly as they were well on the winding dirt path, she hadn't truly expected him to come. Though that did not mean her spirits were no less dampened by the fact. Others might abhor his gray-gold flesh and tittering laugh, but she enjoyed his quips and company and truly would have treasured his wit and presence on the outing. Though to say she did not know the main reason as to why he refrained from joining her would have been a horrid lie.

"I shall snare you a bear, Lady Belle." Gaston had somewhat boorishly jested before they had departed from the castles secure walls. He swept his leg in a courtly bow after insisting upon helping her upon Philippe; though she was more than capable. "Then you may have two beasts instead of one!"

Everyone laughed at his jocular meaning with a bawdy, raucous peal of amusement.

Everyone save her.

Disapproval not only sparked in her brave heart but anger as well. Her nose wrinkled in distaste as she spurred Philippe away. He did not deserve their taunts of monster, beast, and creatures. He was a man, albeit strange, but a man just the same as them.

Of course the morning had not been all droll and tedious, Belle reminded herself primly on the inside. Surprisingly, Gaston had allotted her a few written tomes on his favorite subject of hunting.

The trio of tomes were all in red leather bindings and looked thoroughly thumbed through by thick, calloused fingers. Each smelled of bear grease and armor wax, but they were all written properly and engraved with a few words detailing their insides.

Though the beauty was no avid supporter of slaying animals for trophies and the privileges of swaggering and boasting to kinsmen, she was interested in learning of far away wildlife and hearing the arguments for such blood shed.

Still, she reckoned with a hint of dourness, the interest in the tomes did not overshadow the tedium in which she found herself having to smile and nod every so often to Gaston's droning tones and his gestures that came as examples with his tales or anecdotes of how to trap a certain critter.

"And so that's why white tailed foxes are more brazen to come out in the morning rather than their gray furred cousins who hunt in the night." Gaston finished his lengthy, nearly scholarly explanation on the different species of foxes with a sagely nod of his head.

Riding tall, the knight towered over the tallest of the men about them. In the grayness and the thick fog he seemed a rigid beacon that led the way as cut a path through the supple banks of mists like a hot knife did butter. His cloak fluttered dully with every stride making it seem a pennant strapped to his back.

Pride and a hint of bragging mantled Gaston's shoulders triumphantly. The knight lauded himself on the local bestiary knowledge and even those hundred of miles away. Truly, he could boast he had killed one of every creature in the kingdom and his beast were stuffed and placed in his manse. To Gaston the more he knew the habits of prey the easer they were to snare.

The beauty smiled with insipid warmth that barely touched her plush, pink lips. "Very interesting Gaston, your knowledge of these things is highly remarkable."

Beside the slowly plodding Philippe, Sarah sat frumpily on a gray gelding that seemed none to happy at the brisk trot it had to keep. Hugging her yellow shawl about her shoulders she stared warily out to the edge of the dark forest as she clung to the reigns of her disinterested mare for dear life. "I though we were on the look out for boar." She remarked densely.

Belle clamped an iron will on the nerve not to flinch or allow a groan of despair to escape her lips as her betrothed boisterously delved into the subject of Bristle-Back boars, Ivory Tusk boars, the Red Bellied boars, and the Blind Eyed boars of the marsh lands. To ask of boar, would be an invitation to run a conversation that would only end with a skull bursting with knowledge of boar.

Sarah had unwittingly opened a near endless area that interested the knight and now the price would fall to Belle's head.

Of course, it had been on a search to calm Sarah with cooling reassurance that was the true event that began her being caught out in the chill of dawn and slowly becoming bored to death of the eating habits of tusk-less boar in the first place.

The fault was of her own making, Belle supposed dourly as she feigned another interested smile. Foolishly she had told her dearest Sarah of her lesson to learn to spin; thinking the discussion one of no incrimination and actually a reason to be down in the lair.

She had assumed the unaccepted 'spending time with Rum' Sarah always clucked her tongue in disproval over would finally have a good to come out of her leisurely hours spent down in the dungeon.

Leaving out the damning parts of her visit that had been somewhat comprised of soft touches and a feather kisses here and there, she related the innocent lesson of him teaching her how to spin.

Sarah had not taken _that _well at all.

"To spin, missus!" Her guardian had exclaimed in abject horror to what the beauty thought a fascinating revelation. She flew her tubby hands up in appalling terror as though her ward had claimed to be leading pagan sacrifices. "That is commoner work, gold thread or no! A princess should not be caught spinning, and to learn the art from that thing! Who knows how he makes his gold; straw coated with the blood of children I wager!" The maid servant wrung her work worn hands frantically. "What is a poor servant to do when her mistress wishes to learn the black arts from a terrible monster!"

To clam her beloved keeper, and show she was indeed _not _learning foul arts that her Rum did no even perform, she agreed to attend Gaston's invitation of his hunt. Indeed, that had settled the maid down, and part of Belle could not help but think she had planned something of that nature all along.

Lost deeply in thought while pretending to be interested in the eating habits of boars that so studiously rolled from Gaston's tongue, the amber haired beauty could not help but wonder what her Rum was about in his lair at the moment. How she wished to be with him rather than on some trail to a clearing of wood where the women would wait till the men could drive the boar into the clearing for the show.

Abruptly, a scuffle arose from the back of the retinue. Banshee screams of fair women pierced the foggy morn clearer than the hunter horns call. Equally as nervous horses bucked and whinnied in terror from behind in the sudden surge of confusion.

Tucking the thought of her Rum away for a different time, the beauty heeled Philippe who, like the sturdy war horses of the knights remained fearless but tense. A determined frown lined the beauty's lips as she forced herself not place a hand on the kris under her clothes for comfort. Should they truly be in dire peril, the Dark One would arrive as their aid and drive all who dared harm them back.

"You stay here, milady." Gaston ordered more than suggested. He patted her hand once in some manner of assurance and comfort.

Turning her head to question her fiancé, the mountainous Gaston was already off his charger and headed for the rear of the company. He looked a muscled bull headed for the trouble with a hand on his polished sword hilt, ready to draw and slash at any who posed a threat.

With a slight tug of the leather reigns, Belle turned the loyal animal around to gaze at the cloudy scene. Puckered eyes tried to penetrate the banks of mist that made the back of the caravan all but impossible to see properly.

Shouts arose clearly through the fog, but sounded muffled in the thick mists. At times men would dash though a lighter portion of swirling vapor, but it was all but impossible to tell what exactly was happening. From what Belle guessed by the tumult, a fight had broken out between a hound master and a man in rags with scraps tied around his feet and wearing a torn linen tunic.

"Sit back, Missus." Sarah warned anxiously with a worried look to her charge. "Sir Gaston will take care of this interruption."

The beauty frowned deeply but obeyed. "I can take care of myself, Sarah." She remarked almost stingingly. Even without the Dark One, the blade beneath her chemise was still sharp and she was no fool with how to use a small blade to wreck disastrous effects on foemen.

In moments the scuffle and the curses and shouts died away in the fog. Victoriously, her lumbering betrothed stomped mightily though the mists like a boulder with legs. His large hand held the end of a ragged tunic as he dragged forth a culprit dressed in rags.

The man was a scrawny waif of poor soul. His bronzed flesh stretched over his form like a rack of bones over an ill-fitting garment but his grasping hands were never still and eyes had the pupils of hungry rats. His head was shaggy with filthy black hair and his face sallow and gaunt with a look of fear and repentance; a hungry pauper if Belle ever saw one.

Beaming, Gaston tossed the cur down to the dewed grass and crossed his muscled arms. "He was trying to steal a satchel of food." He proclaimed to the beauty.

The beggar stared upward fearfully. His body shook with cold and dew as he clasped his filthy, bony hands imploringly. "I didn't mean no harm, honest."

Immediately Belle's eyes softened from curiosity to compassion. He was simply a hungry, desperate man looking for a meal. Smiling kindly she nodded. "Certain-."

"Well if you are hungry certainly we will give you food." Gaston interrupted loudly for all to hear. Helping the thin, gangly creature to his feet, he gave the poor soul a hard slap on the back that nearly sent him toppling over.

Guardsmen who had been with their liege lord for years glanced at one another in utter confusion. From under their helms, their gaze eyed their master crazily. Sir Gaston usually had the gallows in store for thief's, even hungry ones, or other forms of demise to serve as entertainment but never kindness. What made their normally calloused captain so caring all of a sudden?

Motioning to a attendant, with the packet of food the waif had been ogling, Gaston handed the hungry soul the satchel of food. Through the exchange, the knight clandestinely winked at the scrawny man who bowed lowly and scuttled away, all the while bowing and lauding the praises of Gaston's kindness while he clutched the packet close to his sunken chest.

Of course there would be no food in the packet, only a large payment of silver coins. Just another way to coax Belle's affection, he preened at his genius. His fiancé had a soft spot for the downtrodden and poor as Sarah had told him, and often went to their aid.

Setting up the minor exchange had been a stroke of ingenuity from the ever clever Gaston. Foolish animals fell for the same ruses as well; thinking a man who left out food kind or careless until they found the man awaiting with an arrow nearby in the bushes.

Belle beamed with unabashed impressments, heedlessly falling for the ruse, as the knight mounted his pawing charger. "I'm impressed, Gaston." She smiled genuinely towards her betrothed. "That was extremely kind of you."

"It's my hope we can better help the poorer people when we become the monarchs of this realm." He revealed proudly as spurred his horse back to its normal canter.

Easily riding abreast with her, he leaned over to the beauty. His lips slightly puckered into the want of a kiss, and in all decorum, there was no qualms of such an act. Perhaps it was even demanded of her for such a noble feat he had just preformed.

Belle grimaced inwardly, her gut twisting in a pang of revulsion. The thought of meeting his lips to her own set a roiled swill sloshing in her belly. Already when they had just begun their departure, she had only let the knight plant a kiss on her cheek and no more. Though she had kissed Gaston many a time before, the thought of sharing the lovely moment of affection seemed not only foul but wrong to her Rum as well. Now that she had kissed Rumpelstiltskin, but not on the lips, could her heart truly hold one above the other?

Forcing down the rise of her distaste, Belle intrepidly forced herself not to draw away or frown in displeasure. It would seem suspicious if she did not award the knight with a quick, proper kiss.

"Sir Gaston we've spotted the tracks of some strange creature up ahead!" A twitchy squire raced forward breathlessly, ruining the moment and saving Belle from simply giving her betrothed a kiss that sparked guilt in her soul. His black livery tunic was sopped with dew and sweat and his eyes wide with a hint of terror.

Disgruntled at having his kiss interrupted, the knight stared down steely eyed at the lanky squire. "What have you found?" He demanded stonily and glared down displeasingly with a faint trace of a cheated snarl hinting his features. "Be warned if this is some sort of ruse there will be stern discipline."

"They are large foot prints; deeper than two man-prints in the muck, sire and claw marks score the damp earth deeper than I've ever seen. By the looks of the tracks it's easier three times bigger than a horse!"

A thunder of rough voices rumbled worriedly in the party of hunters and observant ladies and hound masters and squires. Anxious eyes darted about dubiously at the now ominous border of the forest that seemed to increase its air of sinister unknown. Some cautiously backed their horses further from the entangled woods as though preparing to gallop off.

Excitement filled the knight's eyes and suffused his body with an eagerness that betrayed his want to track the reported creature. Of course hunting such a creature would be perilous and the host of tittering ladies and drawling nobles would be an inconvenience on his sudden mission to bag a new animal.

"Perhaps it would be better if the ladies and those who do not wish to sully themselves in the dirt and grime of the forest should head back." He suggested with feigned casualness and motioned back to the faint outline of the castle swathed in mist behind them.

At the mention of dirt that would stain their cotton and leather riding garments, the ladies began ordering the chaperones to take them away at once. Relief hinted their fair voices as they nearly pranced back to the safe castle. Waiting for the men folk, clean and safe was preferable to being caught in the elements with a dangerous beast on the loose.

Sarah glanced warily at the darkened fringe of the wood as though some beast born of nightmare would charge out the undergrowth. "I think sir Gaston might be right, Missus. Besides, it might be dangerous."

In any other instance, Belle would have fiercely protested the ever cautionary words of her dutiful guardian. She was no coddled noble woman who abhorred dirt and grime or the thrill of danger. Months she had worked in the tiny cottage and enjoyed the labor that branded calloused to her hands and dirt to her clothes. She craved adventure as a thirsty man did a gulp of water, but something greater than even her sense of adventure prodded her - Rum.

"I think you're right, dearest Sarah." Belle agreed mildly, her eyes flickering back to the surprised and grateful Gaston.

Now he had no reason not to be fully invested in his hunt. His attention did not have to vary between tracking prey and wooing the woman to be his bride.

The maid servant beamed happily in the fact that for once that would be no arguing or haranguing from the mistress. Perhaps finally things would work out after all if obedience and dainty nobility were finally being bred within her.

Sarah hummed pleasantly to himself as the retinue of women and a sizable portion of armed guards made their way back to the fog enshrouded keep.

Before they had even gone two steps, Gaston had all but forgotten them to track the strange new prey that promised to be a glorious hunt and a glorious kill. His muffled shouts seemed to toss about the mist as the rest of his men moved forward to view the tracks the squire swore were not far and bigger than a bears.

Clutching her pony's reigns with an iron vice as they plodded through the damp Sarah smiled warmly. "Now don't worry, Missus, I'm sure Gaston will be back soon. A few hours at the most I reckon."

Not if she knew Gaston. Belle hid a wide smile as she focused on the Philippe slowly bobbing head pointed to the ground as he forged his way happily back to the keep where he would be treated with straw and oats.

All knew when her betrothed got wind of a new hunt he could be gone for days at a time in some instances. As long as the beast was on the loose and promised to be a worthy kill for the hunter he would pursue until it either gave up or it vanished into thin air.

In the mean time, Belle laughed inwardly, though a portion of her conscious scolded her roundly for such a thought, she would have more time to spend with Rum.

~8~8~

To be home again! Belle laughed delightedly as she rambled the lavish halls to the destination that beaconed her yearning heart and soul like a load stone to the North Star.

Slipping from under Sarah had been a laughably easy chore now that her dearest guardian was safely off the horse that jounced her about like a potato sack. After fixing her friend a spot of tea and making certain Sarah was comfortable in a plush chair, she had slipped away to finally call upon her Rum.

With Sarah napping and far too indisposed to provoke a comment of her absence, Gaston away on his hunt, and her Papa neck deep in the kingdom affairs, the beauty truly did feel the urge to laugh and sing and skip down the halls jubilantly, and yet properly reserved herself to a small laugh and wide smile.

If nothing else, she surmised gleefully as she opened the thick door leading down to his lair, she would at least have the rest of the day with her Rum.

Pleased with the thought, Belle stepped into the darkness of the caverns, only to be bombarded with thick clouds of steam and smoke. Fumes belched about her and filled the dark dungeon with the sordid mist.

"What in heavens name happened in here, Rum?" Belle exclaimed in surprise as she dared venture farther into the lair and shut the door behind her to prevent alarm from any bypassing servants. The last thing, they needed was rumors blazing about the servants of Hades smoke or a starving dragon or some other harrowing lies on what proliferated the caverns.

Fumes screened the dark cavern, encircling and snaking about the monolithic spears of stalagmite and stalactites. The fog was colored a dark vermilion that gave the caverns and more ominous feeling than before. A malodorous air was carried upon the crimson hued smoke turning the vapors a milky quality of mist and lofted a scent that reminded the beauty of freshly spilt blood.

Terror sprang into her heart as his tittering voice did not respond to her alarmed inquiry. Had a potion gone awry and done something insidious to the Dark Master? Had some spell backfired and wrecked dire havoc?

"Rum!" Belle called through the blankets of smoke as she waved her hand about to shoo away the vapors.

Heedless of her own well being, the beauty raced through the thick clouds, her thoughts only for her Rum and what horrid fate that could have befallen him. A million terrifying thoughts raced through her panicked mind as she screamed his name.

Coughing and chocking upon the noxious mist, the beauty plowed forward to fumble in the dark. Her hands outstretched and moved in the blinding haze as she called his name, each utterance more desperate than the last. Fear welled like a flood for every tenuous moment the singular echo prevailed in the ominous lair.

How could he be gone? Had he succumbed to whatever the smoke had wrought? Did he find a way not to free himself?

"Ru-"

"You called my mistress?" The Dark One's tittering voice asked nonchalantly from beside her.

Hacking upon acrid smoke, her eyes watered and red with fright for him and from the fog, Belle could barely make him out even at arms length.

With a snap of his dark talons the smoke faded into nothingness upon the draft. Light from torches replaced the curtains of smoke revealing a mess strewn about the cold stone floor in a glossy red tint and upon his person. His clothes were covered by the syrupy mess that stained the floor. Gray-gold flesh lay marred by the fluid that also dripped from his hair.

Frigid wind whipping through the caverns was a boon to her lungs as she gratefully breathed in the chilling air.

Staggering back, she felt his hand reach out over her arm to keep her from keening over. His tender grip pulled her close to his body to stay her pitching, dizzying steps. His eyes searched her for any major harm as he relished the opportunity once more to be so close to her without her pulling away in revulsion.

"What…." Another heavy cough rattled from her form before her scorched lungs cleared. "What was all that smoke?"

A sly grin marbled upon the Dark Ones face as he detected no major ill. "A wayward potion." He revealed nonchalantly with a shrug and a flourish of his wiry claws. His brow perched inquisitively. "If it is in my place to ask, mistress what brings you home so early." For a moment his large smile faded into a disgusted thin line of hatred. "I thought your betrothed was entertaining the nobles with a boisterous romp about the forest."

"He was, but some strange tracks made him wish to abandon the extra folk that would hamper his hunting." Belle smiled ruefully, her tongue still foul with blood-smoke. A hint of relief flashed in her azure depths as she laughed slightly and shook her chestnut mane. " Now that I think of it I can't help but assume those tracks weren't made by a beast."

There was far too much suspicion on the deeply etched marks for them to be coincidence in Belle's bright mind. How could a huge, foreign animal, no frightened farmers had ever ran to the palace screaming about, be in their land the day after she had offered her Rum to join the party?

"Oh but they were, mistress." He chuckled in his manic pitch crazily. "Just not the one they think. By the time your betrothed meets up with the strange 'animal' he will find it was all simply a hoax."

Belle tried to scowl to show her disapproval of the Dark One tricks. Her pink lips battled tenaciously between a frown and a smile before her mirth won the day. Light laughter tumbled form her lips in a pleasantness that made the fiend smile wider. "That was horrid of you, Rum. He's going on a wild goose chase."

"Well." He drawled carefully and inched closer. "Tell me you don't approve. I'll take the punishment willfully if I have some how displeased the mistress."

Her sapphire orbs started unblinkingly at him, yet no words crossed her lips. How could she lie to him; could she even deny the truth to his words? Yes, she couldn't refute his words, it was nice to have some time away from Gaston once more.

A singular finger tapped against his leather jerkin in a slightly scolding manner. "No more tricks, Rum; especially against Gaston."

"As the mistress wishes." He bowed obediently to show the deference of her command.

Turning back to the mess that littered the lair, the beauty gestured laconically to the over boiled cauldron and the sticky pool of crimson fluid that marred the floor. "Now what was all this?"

"A simple heath potion that went awry, Mistress." Rumpelstiltskin revealed in a lengthy sigh. His dexterous talons wiped another glob of the vicious fluid from his brown leather attire. "I took my leave to set the ruse and thought I would be back in time to tend the potion."

In truth he had lost track of time watching Belle saddle up in the courtyard with her betrothed and the rest of the nobles. He followed them stealthily through the city as far as the gates, his eyes watching them like a wolf awaiting to strike.

Jealously had reared in him like a tide, washing over all other thoughts. With every touch the brute gently applied to her, his blood boiled and his teeth clenched with rising anger. Only when he witnessed her shy away from a kiss on the lips and instead peck him on the cheek had he smiled. She may not have wished to kiss him on the lips yet, but she was, perhaps involuntarily giving Gaston the same treatment.

To trick the knight had been a spur of the moment decision, but one he did not regret by any stretch of the imagination. Belle was in his lanky arms, not her betroths muscled grip; that had to have meant something.

"And now you must bathe." Her merry peals of laughter echoed about the fanged dungeon, severing his thoughts. She crinkled her nose towards him. "You look as though you've ran through a blood bath. I'll be back later if you like, but for now you have to clean the gunk off."

Mischief donned his gray-gold visage as he leaned closer. Light danced in his eternally ebony orbs as a rumbling noise crooned in his throat. "And if I do what do I get in return?"

Her lips creased into a sly half grin as she slipped from his arms. Her lips slipped close to his ear in a wide smile. "We'll see…" She trailed off and dared a kiss on a spot on his cheek not coated in the ruby substance.

As she sauntered away, singing some quaint bucolic tune, the fiend began to almost zealously figure a way to bathe so that she could once more be nestled in his arms again.

~8~8~

"Are you presentable?" Belle asked cautiously from behind the thick door as she appeared an hour later. One hand curled over the side of the door as she stealthily peeked through the thick portal to the dim lair below. The last thing she wanted to do was catch him not presentable, or so propriety screamed at her. Her heart, however, was blazingly curious to know what the rest of him looked like.

"Of course, mistress." Rumpelstiltskin appeared from the shadow like a phantasmal wraith of a long forgotten legend.

His leather garb was clean of all droplets of vermilion and his skin shimmered with wet the flickering torches insipid light made gleam against his form. Water dripped erratically form his straggly, dirty brown hair letting still warm droplets spill from his shoulders.

He had found a sizable pool of water fed by some underground tributary he had bathed in. And for once, the bath was no so horrid.

Standing tall, he bowed deeply as his owner delicately scaled the slimy stone steps. One hand was behind her back as she neared the fiend, but her hardly noticed as other things pleasantly dashed through his thoughts.

Hope laced his voice as he tented his fingers delicately. Eyes of the blackest coal searched her intrepidly. "I've done as you wished, mistress. Now about my…reward."

"I did say we'll see." Belle grinned mischievously towards the fiend. "You do look clean enough, so I guess I shall give you what has been long overdue."

Eagerness crackled like lightening through his heated, galloping blood. Her words were a sirens call to his ear making his face split with a wide grin of expectation. Excitement danced in his ebony orbs as he neared her curiously. His head cocked to one side. "And uh, what would that be my mistress?"

In a hearts beat she was upon him. One hand sought to still the Dark One while the other that had remained behind her back lashed out revealing a bone tooth comb she wielded like a blade. "It is high time, My Rum, that a comb should meet your hair!"

"What?" The Dark One asked, taken aback. His startled question was far too late, for she was already half upon him with the comb fighting to make him fall to a level she could attack his hair properly.

Though she had taken him by surprise to attack his dirty locks, he was the taller of the two, meaning she would have to reach up if he would only stay still.

Which of course he would not.

One hand grappled with him to make him sit whilst the other tried to reach his matted tresses with the bone tooth comb that could most certainly do the job of untangling his hair.

Struggling, Rumpelstiltskin protested doggedly as he tried to dodge and divert his persistent mistress. "Stop this at once! Unhand me you deceitful woman!"

"I would nary have to use deceitful means if you would simple comb your own hair." She replied in a laugh as she tried to pull him to the ground and attack his follicles with a vigor.

Though the Dark One's strength measured far more than any mortals, he could only do so much to halt his mistress so the dagger would not rear to protect its keeper, and nothing would dissuade her from her quest. In the end he would have to bow to her desire and do as she willed though he abhorred her treatment.

Disgruntled, he sat down sullenly as he partially endured her treatment while fidgeting. His body squirmed unpleasantly with each run of the comb before it was jammed and she fought to work the instrument through his tangles.

"Stay still you silly man and let me get this gunk from your hair!" Belle declared as she went to her task with a hearty determination.

How the fiend flailed. He squirmed fitfully like a gunny sack filled with writhing snakes and cursing in outrage.

The Dark One protested, his face twisted in pain with each heart tug of the comb through his dampened hair. "This is an outrage. I am the Dark One I should have my hair the way I like!"

"Matted does not count as a hair style." Belle chided good-naturedly with another tug.

The bone comb yanked again at his straggly tresses with a determined pull. A yelp erupted from the fiend thing gray lips at her ministrations. The woman could be doggedly insufferable at times!

Agitation and humor surged within him like battling tide to overtake him. He should have been angry, furious even, and yet he felt amusement and a playfulness he had only known as a boy.

Smiling thinly he tried to leap up.

Belle began to stand, in the same instance, trying to make him sit again.

"Enough of this!" He roared playfully. His normal guise fell away to unleash a part of him that had not been seen in centuries.

His wiry talons curled over her wrist that wielded the culprit of his pain. Swiveling about, his other arm began to wrap about her to hold her close and steal a few kisses for her crimes against his hair.

As he pulled her close, Belle pushed towards him to force him down once more. With their odd potions mingled with trying to rise, the pair went tumbling down once again in a heap of limbs and cries of laughter.

Forced to protect his mistress from harm, the fiend, turned so that he landed squarely upon the stone to save her even a scratch that could mar her lovely body. Echoes of the noise resounded about them in faraway resonance, bouncing upon the stone teeth of the caverns.

Laughter streamed gaily from their lips as they rolled about mockingly fighting for the detested comb. Hands struck out for the instrument as they clawed for the instigator of all their trouble and the key that had broken their normal actions into an outlet of play.

Shouts and cries of glee echoed from the cavern stone spears standing in solemn vigil at the spectacle of the pair. For a moment both simply lost themselves like they hadn't in years. Propriety, decorum, and the masks worn for ages fell away to reveal to giggling adults wrestling over a comb

A poorly placed stalagmite was the only thing that halted the break in their normal demeanor. In but a hearts beat the spell of freedom away from duty and the veils they enshrouded themselves ended with a jarring abruptness.

After the sparse dust had settled and the wind whipped away the echo of their jesting shouts, they gathered themselves enough to view their situation. Belle lay atop the fiend, her body nearly flush with his own as though a fitting piece to a puzzle. The comb that sparked their lack of decorum was nowhere to be found.

Laughter tapered away hesitatingly as they finally ended their playful war.

For a moment bother stared at one another. Their eyes peered curiously at each others features searchingly as though seeing into the very rawest of their hearts for but a brief instance.

What had caused them to break their normal demeanors and habits in those few moments?

Breath heaved laboriously from their bodies as they stared frozenly. Another heartbeat slipped away into eternity before the pair found the will to thaw the nerves, which encased them in stone, and smile.

Belle's sky blue eyes gleamed unabashedly with merriment and something else entirety that warmed Rumpelstiltskin's frozen heart like a summer sun warmed snow into nothing more than a puddle.

"I'm glad you weren't hurt today. I was worried about you when I saw all the smoke and you didn't respond." The beauty admitted lowly from the well spring of her soul.

Never, even when the ogres were all but at their doors, had she felt such the icy grip of terror. Not knowing if he were well was a thought that wrangled the breath from her lungs. Her heart felt void and filled with dread coupled by a rising panic that wanted to vomit from her throat.

A soft smile etched Belle's lips as she gave him a kiss on the cheek; simply happy he was still in one piece. How much did he mean to her now, that she shivered at the thought of him meeting his end?

As Rumpelstiltskin returned the gentle kiss, with a tenuous tender touch of his own, in her mind Belle could not fathom having to meet her lips to Gaston's in the eternal sign of affection any longer.

More of her soul wanted Rum, and only Rum.


	17. Decisions

Cold rain fell in heavy, gray torrents upon the realm of King Maurice, soaking the woodland and all its unwanted guests with their fat, chilling pellets. The murky gloom of the verdant forest loomed darkly over the quartet of the knight and his most trusted warriors; all armed with sturdy bows and spears and brandishing them murderously in the damp.

Silvery white mist that rose sluggishly from the rich, moist land and coiled under their black boots added a pointed dread that chilled their blood to ice. The land emanated a frigid cold that stiffened their bones and a sinister aching pronounced the weariness that flagged their hearts of courage.

"We've tracked the monster to its foul lair." Gaston whispered clandestinely through chattering teeth to his fellow hunters.

For one long, tiresome week they had tracked what looked to be a huge, fearsome creature that lumbered though the forest thickets. The creature seemed to have no regard for the prickliest of paths or the steepest of rocky gorges in its path; a path Gaston had followed dutifully without erring even if it meant stomping through a bracket of thorns or a nest of tangled vines.

Every large buck that darted their way they let live and every fox and squirrel the hunters could have easily brought down with their slings were left to scamper unmolested about as their captain demanded they followed the one prey caught in his sights but never actually saw.

Only the large, impossible to miss, marks kept them trekking through the weather and the horrid locations, but they persevered until they had nary enough to see them back to the kingdom safely.

When the dawn of the last day, before Gaston sent one of his men back to the kingdom for more supplies, rose, the dreary sun had yielded the freshest tracks yet to the mysterious beast that lurked the thick coppices of pines and oaks and elms. The tracks were moist and clawed deeply into the earth as though the creature were finally tired of leading them trough the depths of the woodland.

With blood in his nose and the dream of another fabulous trophy in his mind, Gaston plowed on staunchly through the last miles to reach a black, gaping cave that now stood before them.

The fetid stench of must and decay wafted pungently from the maw of the dark space and clung thickly to the damp earth like a sour taste did a tongue. Cold air, more frigid than the touch of death, oozed from the entrance setting their bones to quaking. A strange, whistling sound seemed to eek from the darkness in the belly of the cavern.

"We've probably caught it asleep." Gaston peered intently into the blackness as though he could catch a glimsp of the magnitude of the creature breathing the deep breath of slumber. Yes, this would be his finest catch in years!

Knotting his jaw stoically, he forced down a pang of fear and allowed excitement to sluice away any other sensation except survival. His thick, rain slicked fingers wrapped tightly over the haft of his war spear.

Not daring to turn his eyes away from the black portal, he twisted his head just slightly to the shaking men behind him. "On the count of three we charge. Our cries and the sudden rush should effectively confuse it before it can do any real harm to us."

A slight clinking of mail armor with their silent nodding came as the only reply. Their boots squished through the muddy terrain as they neared inch by inch, barely daring to breath.

Licking his lips before steeling himself, the knight let out a resounded battle cry that shook the boughs of the wet trees and disturbed nesting birds from their lofts. "Now!" He screamed and dove in, his spear thrust high.

Weapons flashing in the gray dawn, his men raced behind their fearless leader determined to kill the beast before vice versa could happen to them.

Blackness enshrouded the hunters as they pitched forwards into blackness. Screams and cries rebounded on the smooth stone walls as they blindly thrust and slashed into nothingness.

"Where is it?" One asked roughly, his voice strained from screaming.

Another waved his blade perilously as though trying to feel through the dark like a blind man with his walking stick. "Has someone hit it yet?"

"Why isn't it roaring in pain, Sir?" Yet another dully asked Gaston.

"I don't think there's anything in here." Gaston's voice growled in annoyance, his voice reverberating dangerously at the thought of the beast slipping through his fingers once more. Though the dark he motioned back to the exit. "Out, the lot of you, there is obviously no giant beast in here. I'll try to feel around for anything; I'll yell if I need aid."

Obediently, and with more than a hint of relief, the quartet of hunters staggered out into the deluge once more.

Gaston plodded out not long after, his body quivering violently as though he had been dunked in an icy river. Anger wrench violently upon his normally handsome features. A seething red hue painted his face and a huge blue vein pulsed erratically on the left side of his neck.

His sword was sheathed and yet one hand clutched a singular rose in his vice grip. Bright blood oozed from between his battle calloused fingers where the thorns had speared into his flesh. A small note tied by a golden piece of twine hung just under the rose's bulb.

Disregarding all those about him, and even the icy rain that did nothing to quell his fire of rage, the furious knight snapped open the note. His eyes scanned over the simple epistle, knowing who had set it there for him already.

"A consolation prize for all your efforts, Dearie." He snarled aloud through gritted teeth. "Signed, the only beast you will never catch."

Eyes ablaze with the fire of stoked fury, the knight crumpled the note into rain wetted pulp in his bleeding hand. Belle's Beast had tricked him, sending him on a wild, errant hunt for some thing that didn't even exist!

Not only was the ruse an insult and audacious show of blatant disrespect, he now touted the fact that now Gaston would have nothing to show for his dogged week long venture out roaming the kings woods like a mad man!

A primal growl escaped his lips as he tossed the rose and the note down to the damp, leaf strewn ground. His boot smashed down upon the singular flower crushing the bulb and squishing the culprit of his mockery deep into the rich earth. A new, fresh determination glinted maliciously in his orbs with the fervency that had never before been alit in the knight.

Stomping back to the tethered, exhausted horses, Gaston grumbled like the roiling thunder above. "We'll see if your words be true, Beast. I mean to subdue you should it take the last mortal breath in my body!"

Nobody made Gaston look the fool!

~8~8~

"In a hurry are we, my mistress?" Rumpelstiltskin queried amusedly before taking another bite of a buttery breakfast pastry.

Across the stone that served as their table, his kind owner tucked away the sparse meal with an admirable haste. The beauty gulped down another portion of food with a passionate rapidity as though it would all disappear at any moment. Their ritual supping of tea, they normally partook of anytime they were together, was already drained from her dainty porcelain cup and the food on her plate half eaten.

Swallowing, she nodded almost dourly. "I can't stay for long; news has been told from out runners that Gaston is on his way back and should be here later this morning."

"Hefting a ferocious beast across his shoulders he slew with his bare hands no doubt." The fiend smiled evilly behind the fine gilded rim of his chipped cup whilst he nursed his tea.

At times, the beauty could not help but notice; his manners were improving, at least about her. He seemed as though he was attempting to better himself and not act like a hungry creature just found in the woods.

Belle smirked half amusedly at the Dark One for his quip. Forcing herself to eat at a slower pace to conceal her worry, she gulped down another bite. "Let's just hope he doesn't know the whole hunt was a set-up."

"Well…" He looked away and feigned interest at a pebble down at his boot.

Cutlery clattered upon the cold stone slab as the beauty stared at him. Her former amusement deteriorated into deep concern. "Rum, you didn't."

"I'm terrible at stealth, Mistress." The fiend sniggered impishly. "What good is making someone look the fool if they don't know that they have been tricked?"

Sighing lugubriously, mingled with stark agitation, the beauty frowned in displeasure. "I'm not surprised, but now this makes things difficult. Gaston will be shrieking to the rafters demanding you to be punished."

"And will you?" The fiend flourished his needle-like talons carelessly through the chill air. "Will you take me out to the town square and have me put in the stocks to appease your betrothed's pride?"

She shook her head somberly. "You know I will never do that, but this makes things…perilous." Steam wisped and clashed with the cool air as she sipped her tea. "Gaston hates you, you know."

"Of course he does." The fiend whispered almost victoriously as he placed his cup back in its matching saucer with a reminded gentleness. His scaled hand lifted to her cheek in a tender touch that brought a faint, longing smile to Belle's lips. "I have the heart of his betrothed." He finished lowly.

Belle pulled away as though struck. Panic darted in her azure as she recoiled from his words that sparked guilt in her heart. "You presume much, Rumpelstiltskin." She remarked sharper than she actually intended.

The Dark One grimaced deeply, his head bowed submissively. She only called him his full title when she was vastly displeased.

"How long are we to play this game?" He inquired drearily and poked at his disregarded meal sullenly. "Skulking about in shadows, under the cloak of darkness? I grow weary of only having you when you can slip away. Make up your mind, mistress. I've made up mine; you know what lies in the depths of my heart. What of you, what are you to do with a fiancé above and a monster below?"

Over the time spent together, the question had grown more obvious and pronounced betwixt them. Decisions had to be made and heart ache had to be slashed through the chest in and never to be mended wound.

Belle averted her gaze. What could she say in the face of such truths to combat his words? Day after day she put off her decisions, reveling in the touch of the Dark One in the evening and tossing and turning with guilt at night. "I'm still trying to think." She answered pathetically, knowing the answer would never suffice.

"Trying isn't good enough." The Dark One rebuffed. "The day is drawing nearer by the second. Will you wait only moments before the altar, or still put it off then? Will you lie to yourself and say you're being loyal to your husband all the wile stealing kisses and soft words with the Beast in the dungeon? Who will it be, mistress, me or him?"

Why could she simply not rend the veil of their affection charade asunder? Why did she have to draw what they knew was coming through the mud until the day of judgment when decision were unavoidable?

Standing up suddenly, the beauty swiveled away. Arms clasped about her she made haste to the door. "Rum…I." Her words drained off uncertainly.

"Of course, mistress." The fiend spat acidly, his eyes boring into her back.

Lately his loving owner avoided the subject like the plague. The hour was drawing in near and they both knew it. The kingdom had almost been rebuilt and repaired to its former glory. Warmth of summer put the spirit of celebration in the people's hearts in prime wedding fashion.

Both knew the only way to keep a grand, royal wedding from not occurring was another war, or for her to finally come out with her feelings.

"Impossible." Rumpelstiltskin muttered lowly with anger mingled with forlornness under his breath as she exited his lair. He scoffed rudely at the thought of his mistress proclaiming her feelings to any but him.

Furiously he leapt up, his tea forgotten, to give vent to his roiling emotions that he had not quite gotten back under his reign. Hands curled into fist he slunk through the caverns in surly fashion as his mind whirled with thoughts. Perhaps only still being undecided was a show of pity for him. Mayhap she did know her choice, but wanted to keep from harming him so terribly.

Given the choice Belle would not choose someone like him; who was he trying to fool to think she would? How could she admit to the world she liked a scaly, horrendous imp as himself; more beast than man. Too many he was merely a thing that could wear men's clothes and speak in their tongue. He could never be something anyone could admit to caring for aloud.

To be sure Belle was a wonderful woman, but even kindness and curiosity had its limits with one such as him. He was no poor farmer with a brave heart as in the bard's tales or a prince in disguise. Truly he was a monster in every sense of the word.

How could she even think to choose a beast over a handsome, beloved knight?

~8~8~

"23rd day of the summer's apex!" Gaston proclaimed proudly to his betrothed as he brazenly traipsed into her bedchambers.

Mud from his sopped boots stained the exquisite carpets and he dripped wet all upon the floors in his mad dash up the spiral stairs and through the lengthy corridors.

Behind him an army of ladies who had only half heartedly tried to halt the knight peeped in from the door way to their mistress' quarters. No one begrudged Gaston from a break propriety, not with such news and how romantically he had belted her name on his mad gallop up the cobblestone streets to the palace and had swooped up the stairs to see his love.

Belle's head shot up at his sudden presence in her room. She sat on her plush window seat staring forlorn and torn out of the pane to the ants of people below. Her brow was beetled with craggy lines of concern and her face darkened with melancholy.

No doubt pining for him, Gaston gloated inwardly as she turned to him.

A weary smile traced Belle's lush pink lips. "Gaston, I saw you gallop in the courtyard. I'm glad to see you home." Her brow arched quizzically. "Now what exactly are you talking about; the 23rd?"

His chest protruded like a barrel as he swaggered towards her, his boots squishing with each measured stride. "The day we are to be wed of course! I was inspired on the ride back home."

After coming back with nothing to show from his toils, and a rose that lay in the mud and told of the culprit, he was determined now to make Belle his own; if just for the sake of doing something to come close to control of the Beast. Later in their relationship he could perhaps come by commanding the beast, but for now simply to have her and steal more of her time than her precious Dark One, was a savory cutlet of revenge.

Dread coiled like a large serpent about the beauty's heart, squeezing in a vice that refused to relent.

"W…wonderful, Gaston." Belle lied behind a wide smile. "But don't you think three weeks is a bit of a short notice?"

By the time of the wedding the height of summer would come at its peak and all the land completely green and alive. The feasts would be overflowing, as always a good sign to a long and happy marriage.

"Not at all." His voice softened as he knelt in posterity by the window seat. His calloused hand shelled over hers in a tender yet cold touch. "I can barely wait another minute, but I want to give you the proper wedding you deserve with all the pomp and grandeur befitting one as lovely as you. Three weeks is the closest I can come without carrying you over my shoulder this very moment and racing down to the temple."

At the door, sighs erupted collectively from the hapless maids as they enviously or happily stared at the scene of princess and her knight. Tears openly streamed form Sarah's dimpled face as she dabbed them away with the cuff of her dress.

"That's very kind of you, Gaston." Belle paused, her heart somersaulting in her chest. " But I…I…" How could she say what lay in the depths of her heart and cast aside the duty for her people.

She had not expected the news so soon; to know he wished to have the wedding at such a date sent her head reeling. The time to choose a path had come, before it could get anymore out of control, and now she was frozen by a place and time too soon for comfort. If only she had had a few more hours, a few more years, a lifetime to make up her mind.

Gaston beamed widely as though basking in her delicate features. "You're speechless as I knew you would be." Reverently, he kissed her hand as he stood. "Now I believe I have broken the rules of courtliness for all I can. I hope to see you later to announce the date to the rest of our people. They will be scurrying like beetles to have things prepared once the news is broken."

With that, the hulking knight strode out, his head held high. The gaggle of attendants watched and followed his every step all save one; the one that knew the now silent beauty ever since she had been pushed from the womb.

"Something wrong isn't it, Missus?" Sarah observed softly, from the threshold.

Tears welled in the beauty's eyes transmuting her azure orbs into a shimmering crystal. Pulling her knees up to her chest, she placed her head on her knees. "Everything is wrong, Sarah. Everything."

"You've always been able to tell me anything, child." Sarah waddled in and quietly shut the door to keep away prying eyes and ears. These were not tears of joy she saw upon her mistress, but tears of sorrow only a vastly hurt soul could know. Her face softened to motherly affection that comforted the young woman slightly. "I've always been here for you."

The beauty sniffed, her eyes stinging to dam the flow of tears she cursed for breaking free. "What I tell you, you must hold to your heart. Let it never pass your lips, Sarah; swear too me."

"I've never broken a promise to you; missus and I don't intend to start now. You've told me everything in your life, don't shut me out now when I can see you are in distress." The maid servant implored as she petted her charges thick mane. "I swear, child, your secrets have always been safe with me."

Never would she betray Belle, never would she give away the box in her heart that had kept all the girls private thoughts no other would ever hear!

For long moments neither spoke. Both simply sat quietly, with Sarah stroking her hair as she used to as a child when she sobbed of her lost mother or any other hurt that scarred her heart.

"Sarah I…I don't love Gaston." Belle revealed simply, with the flood of tears held in check once more. "I've never loved him."

Inside her tormented body, the words had a liberating feeling deep in the recesses of the beauty's soul. What once felt fettered and kept under the years of acceptance and silence was unlocked with words spoken aloud that had been holed up and looked upon as anathema inside her for so long.

How long had she been afraid of saying those words aloud?

Sarah's watery eyes darted crazily as she looked upon her charge. "What?" She murmured as though not comprehending the words that tumbled from her wards lips. What madness had come upon her mistress?

Tilting her head up, a new light shown through the beauty as though a pure fire had been set in her soul. Each word formed carefully as though she could not belief it herself. "I don't love Gaston. I never have."

"Oh child." Sarah almost sobbed as she fell hard to her knee next to her mistress. "Love will come in time. It will grow. With such a handsome, noble man as your husband you will learn to love."

Belle shook her russet mane. "I have thought, nay wished, so for the longest time as well. For years all I have thought of was my duty and honor that has always been expected of me and how even if I did not love Gaston, it would come in time. But love isn't taught Sarah, at least, not true love, nor is it merely a brief flickering thing."

Clasping her hands with the guardians she tried her best to explain to the woman who had raised her and only wanted the best for her. "I can never feel true love for Gaston, and if I marry him, all I do afterwards will be a line of bad decisions that will breed a vile bitterness and enmity in me. No one will gain from that; not me or the people, or even Gaston, the one I would truly be hurting. Perhaps it seems selfish and makes me a truant and derilicit of my duty, and perhaps this is all very self centered, but you must understand, finally admitting it aloud has freed what has been whispered to me all my life since I understood what an arranged marriage was. I don't love Gaston. I will not marry him."

A thin smile etched her lips towards the numb, wide eyed Sarah who was far too stunned to speak. "I can't say I am not frightened from this decision. No one will take this news well. Poor Papa the hardest of all I think, and you dearest Sarah, I'm so sorry. This is the life you wanted for me; always wanting me to have the best and happiest. But, I will take what's coming to me and not flinch. The decision is made now; whatever shall come will come."

Frozen, Sarah only mildly registered the beauty plant a gentle kiss on her temple. Her very step seemed to float upon air as she departed from the room leaving the maid all alone.

How could this come to pass, Sarah pondered through her mind as what looked like a perfect world shattered before her eyes with one admittance. What foulness had steeped into her mistress' heart to say such ludicrous things. What manner of enchantment had claimed her mistress that would inevitably destroy an arrangement for decades made?

Worry crackled against the servants nerves as she finally turned back to look at the open door. For the first time in many, many years hatred clawed at her heart. None of this had occurred or even been a problem before _It _came into their lives.

~8~8~

The fetid darkness that proliferated in the cold dungeons mirrored the Dark One's sullen heart. His talons spun the wooden wheel in a melancholy tempo as he stared disparagingly at the thin spokes.

Mind lost in deep contemplation, he hardly cared of the mechanical task he could do in his sleep. As always, his thoughts revolved around the person that had stolen his heart - Belle.

He should not have cared a whit of the inevitable end that was most certainly to crash down upon his head any day now. From the beginning he should have known the ending to their tryst and acted accordingly, but his weak heart had succumbed to her creamy skin and lush kisses.

Her choice would be placed before her and she would travel down the road that demanded she be brave. Only an end without him in it would be the logical choice, and Belle was nothing if not logical. She probably had more sense than the entire noble court!

"I will not care when she tells me she is to be wed." Rumpelstiltskin lied fervently to himself, his words more akin to commands to himself with each spin of the wheel. "It shall take me longer to be free, and I never bedded the chit as I planned, but why should I care after that? More inconvenience is all this has wrought; nothing more. I don't care."

But he did, the fiend knew with an infuriatingly inkling of truth that nibbled at his soul.

The fiend did not wish to lose her or come in second place. He wanted her all and entirely to himself.

Part of the surly Dark One should have been furious his carefully constructed schemes had all been dashed by his errant affections for the woman, but all he could feel was dire gloom that enameled his shriveled black heart and weighed upon it like a stone.

To save them both pains that would score the wounds deeper in their souls he should have broken their tryst off long ago. Yes, the day she kissed him he should have denied any other means of affection. He should have become twice as beastly and dangerous, but had not.

Truly, that should have been his choice but he had taken the route of pleasure instead and happily reveling in another who did not leer in disgust of him. It was novel for him not be looked upon in disgust and hatred.

A sigh pierced past his lips as he tossed his head. That had to change, before he could hurt her more and end up damning himself to the point of no return. If she had not the strength to part, then he at least had to try for both their sakes.

"Rum." Belle's voice resounded about his head like temple bells severing his train of thought.

His mouth felt as dry as a desert as he rose on instinct more than will. She stood before him just as he turned, her eyes the color of blue flame.

This was it, his mind whispered to him, just by seeing the elevated look upon her lovely visage. Nerves thrilled crazily through his lanky form.

"Gaston set the date three weeks from today." She revealed slowly to steady her quaking voice. Rum would be the first too learn the news and perhaps bolster her when she had to stand shame faced in front of the entire realm and tell them there was to be no wedding.

Before another word could bypass her lips, the fiend spoke hastily. The phrases he meant to say to show his uncaring instead were replaced by gushing words spoken from the depths of his soul.

"Let me be your lover." The Dark One murmured softly, his head down turned in pleading. "You can marry Gaston and still be with me. Many nobles have lovers, why should you be different? I know you couldn't possibly choose me, but I do not wish to give up your kisses and your words and your touch. Perhaps when we first began I could have truly stopped this…whatever we have, but I am too far gone now."

At the fleeting moment, he cared not what manner of absurd words crossed his lips. Too know Gaston had set the date, and a soon one at that, sent his heart trembling with panic. The need for her to be near and close and feel her skin was a wine he had no desire to give up no matter what things the darkness inside him whispered. He couldn't lose her, not when she awoke things in him, even though it meant having to be less than he was.

He knew himself a monster and a beast in her lovely eyes, why would she have chosen him over the noble Gaston? Monsters never won the fair maiden but did that mean he could no longer share her affection?

No, he could not bear if their affection ended. Rather he be in shadow, a dirty secret, detesting his heart and cursing his mortal affections bitterly for the rest of his years, than be away from her. His will was broken to her, and he would sooner beg that give up the forgotten humanity and love she sparked within.

Darkness festering inside his form raged perniciously after speaking the words deep in his soul. After all his denial that he wished for her choice to be quick and that he would be calloused, and his prompting for her to be quick with her inevitable choice, he stood before her, his pride tossed to the wind, begging her not to withhold her touch when she was wed.

Tears brimmed in the beauty's cerulean eyes as she cupped his downcast face in her hands. She lifted his oddly scaled visage to meet her eye to eye. "I don't need to keep this love a secret, Rum. I choose you." Belle replied tenderly before pressing her lips against his.

~8~8~

_A/N: I know what you're thinking. Why did she tell Sarah? Well, look at it this way. Sarah has been like a mother to Belle, and though they might not see eye to eye, they love one another. Sarah has been Belle's only true friend her entire life and she trusts her, so why wouldn't she tell her when everything is coming together at the worst possible time? _


	18. True Love?

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals! I'm happy you're enjoying so far. :3_

**~8~8~**

Love, how sweet the word tasted with her soft mouth pressed against his lips. How pure the light that erupted from that one singular word which scoured away the wretched blackness of his ancient heart. How wonderful it felt to be loved again and to truly repay that love in kind.

Emotion so long bereft in his gray-gold skin awakened as one from a long, troubled slumber. Love, tender and vibrant, flared with a passion that had for far too long been kept writhing and subdued under the evil claws of sinister will and the sickly taint in his soul.

The wonder and light that blazed within was not merely any love galloping madly through his veins and heralding his long forgotten goodness back to the forefront of his heart. No, it was a love that surpassed all - True Love.

Warmth filled the voided coldness that leeched his spirit dry of all compassion. Light whisked away the foul darkness that whispered his deviousness which he had festered in for so long he had forgotten anything else. Wholeness, true and fulfilling, engulfed him in an ensorcelled completeness, battling away the evil the accursed blade had bestowed upon him the moment he had stabbed Zoso and was infected with the tainted powers.

In that wondrous instance, he felt loved and happy and whole and…mortal.

A peculiar strangeness shivered warmly across his gray-gold flesh like ripples in a placid lake. His heart began to beat once more in an easy rhythm with only the blood in his veins as the darkness which had kept him alive for so long clawed frantically inside him.

The blackness inside raged and pitched crazily within as it slowly ebbed away into nothingness from his veins and thoughts.

Breaking away from the gentle caress of his mistress' lips against his, he gulped in the cold air, and for the first time realized how abjectly frigid his lair was. Magic was losing affect on his body, and rapidly deteriorating inside him like a fire suddenly damped by water.

"What's…what's happening?" Rumpelstiltskin murmured in dull astonishment. His voice no longer sounded high pitched and tittering, but almost human again. Wide eyed, the fiend stared down at his hands, to see the calloused palms of a spinner instead of his scaled claws.

How was this happening? How could his humanity be rushing back in to eliminate the dark taint that so long comprise his being?

Belle's azure eyes alit in wonderment at the transforming sight before her. Bit by bit darkness alleviated from his form as though being pushed away by a powerful forces that brought light to his body and a humanness to his eyes. About his lips the gray-gold flesh was dissipating into soft bronzed skin that came from toiling in the sun. Lips once thin and gray became pink and normal giving her a glimpse of a face of a man. Looking deep into his orbs, his eyes lost their encompassing sable hue to be replaced by a warm, chocolate brown of a long forgotten man.

"You're changing." The beauty whispered in joyous awe. Jubilant laughter tumbled past her lips as she ran her hands through his straggly hair. "Rum, you're changing. I think you are turning into a man."

Truly then, Belle crowed inwardly, miracles could happen. With Rum as a man no longer would people murmur he was a monster. As an ordinary human he could forgo the evil that had taken root in his soul, and learn all there was to being once more merely flesh and blood.

A man, the very word chilled the Dark One's blood to rivers of ice. Alarm shrilly screamed through the malicious fiend like the shriek of a mourning banshee. How could he be transforming back into a puny mortal? It had to be a mistake, some enchantress trick or power sent against him trying to subdue him.

Should he become a man, all his machinations, his powers would be for not. As a man he would be vulnerable and weak and the same pitiful Rumpelstiltskin that had kissed the knights boots and limped his way home a disgrace!

"You are, you are!" She cheered delightedly as his face began to clear to weathered man-flesh. It was happening, just like in the books she had read as a child claimed. "Kiss me again, Rum; it's the kiss it's turning you into a human!"

Leaning towards her love, Belle desired to feel the wondrous press of his lips in hopes to complete the transformation and have the Rum she knew had always lingered in his scaled body.

"No!" Rumpelstiltskin roared savagely as though he had been wounded. His growling voice echoed upon the stone spears of the dim caverns with a furious timbre that made the ominous darkness seem to recoil at his flare of fury.

Stepping away from her warm body and the mouth that nearly caused his doom, the fiend wiped his mouth with the back of his once more scaled claw and tossed his head violently as though shaking off some physical blow. Staggering away, he snarled like some dangerous wounded animal warning her to keep her distance. In his body, he frantically clawed at the last frayed thread that was his powers to bring them back. He couldn't lose his curse, not when he had so much that would come toppling over his head.

Immediately, the darkness once more reared to protect the accursed Dark One and engulf him with evil power he so craved. Magic fire burned through his veins in a fierce conflagration that reduced the love and goodness humming through his blood to blackened char. The light which once illumed so brilliantly, damped to a poor flicker and was violently snuffed out by the foul breath of blackness that sluiced over him.

Every crevice of his dark, stony heart was filled with blackness and vileness and maliciousness intent that for so long had bred in him and turned him into the beast of lore. Evil thrilled through his body and rejoiced in its glorious return to its cunning host.

In that singular moment he had nearly lost his powers to the woman who had all but made him a pet. Somehow he had been cleverly manipulated into thinking she actually loved him and that he loved her.

Galling rage stormed perniciously in his cold sable heart with the strength of the most powerful gales ever known. Terror, thick and burning through his blood, brought the beast lurking still in his soul out with claws flashing and fangs bared murderously.

His jaw worked tightly as he stared with a scathing hatred at the beauty. "You, cunning, deceitful, witch! You knew this would happen; you tried to break me!"

"Rum…what are you talking about." Belle's brows knit confusedly. Joy, dead and gone, like the fleeting moment where the entire world had been right with them, was replaced by misunderstanding and wary fear. Never before had she seen him so enrage, not even when he discovered his dagger had been unearthed and she was his master.

If he heard her words it never showed. Only sheer anger registered to his now wild, barbaric senses that screamed, nay demanded, for him to lash out to hurt the foul trickster that betrayed him and to clutch at his coveted power with every force of will in his body.

"I see now." The Dark One hissed venomously, his ebony eyes ablaze with the roaring fires of hell dancing through the returned void. He pointed an accusatory talon at his mistress. "This is how you planned to be rid of me all along wasn't it? You never wanted to free me or share anything with me. Now that I have lived past my usefulness and you are engaged to be wed, you thought to make certain I would no longer be a problem."

"Rum what are you…?" The beauty began, but he interrupted her with a feral cry.

To far gone, the imp snarled nastily, his blackened teeth flashing past pried lips. "Or maybe you just became tired of watching your back, eh? Couldn't stand every day making sure the slave wouldn't break loose and kill the mistress? Did you just want to make sure since you have enough gold to last five lifetimes I'd no longer be a threat? Or perhaps you just wanted the legendary recognition of slaying the Beast!" He roared with all the fury raging in his soul. The echoed cries of accusation resounded about them like thunder as though invisible persons in the blackness were agreeing with his conclusions.

"Rum." Belle's voice beseeched him pleadingly to see reason. Her voice, frail compared to his own, seemed pathetic and brittle as she stepped towards him warily. Troubled cobalt orbs searched him desperately. "Don't you see, something wonderful and magical has happened because of our love."

Did he truly believe she desired to hurt him? Even after all the time they spent in one another's arms, whispering of their affection, had these fears lurked in the back of his head and plucked at the strings of his sanity? How long had those terrible thoughts festered within and poisoned his mind?

Love. The word, once as filling and sweet as summer honey, felt akin to funeral ashes upon his tongue. How he despised the word; how deceptive and damning it could be! Love, the key to destroy him!

Without thought, the fiend grabbed the beauty shoulders in a vice. Black nails dug deep into her creamy flesh, nearly upon the cusp of shredding skin and bringing forth her life's blood. The magic of the dagger reared to protect its wielder, but the monster barely noticed the pain.

Lashes of flame in his body felt as pinpricks stabbing his nerves. The icy tremors that sought to shake him were little more than chilling breezes upon his bone. Physical pain paled to the hurt his heart sustained with her treachery.

No physical pain imaginable could quell his fury enough to let her go. The pain in his heart hurt more than any other in his long life.

Growling perniciously, he allowed the anger of centuries to explode from his dark heart like a fetid tidal wave washing away any tenderness he ever felt. "Silence your lies. This isn't love, this is nothing but a lust I let get out of control! You can't love me. No one can ever love me!"

"Rum please!" Belle begged desperately, her heart twisting with every vile word that spat past his thin, gray lips. Claws of cruelty slashed at her spirit with a fervency which brought a lump to her throat.

How could he possibly think betrayal and murder prowled her heart; a heart that was always so open and raw to him?

"I'll kill you!" The fiend muttered savagely through clenched teeth. Eyes of the darkest ebony narrowed into twin slits that brimmed with malicious, murderous intent. "Even should it cost me my own life I will kill you for this treachery you've plied your hand towards me; for playing my heart and making me a witless fool!"

Tears shimmered like diamonds in Belle's azure orbs. What only a few moments ago had been serenely wonderful now turned into a fight for her life, with an enraged monster that would willing destroy himself if simply to see her perish. How had such a turn occur so rapidly?

"Stop!" Belle ordered tremulously, her voice a quavering gasp. Fear for her life was the only instinct that broke over the surface of her rising wave of utter despair. "I command thee to stop, Dark One."

Instantly the claws that fallowed deep in her arms relented their vice grip. The heat of his fury that seemed to lash at her abated from so close to her form as he staggered back forcefully.

Anger, more fearsome than she had ever seen, danced darkly upon his oddly scaled features. With every scrap of him he fought to bypass the declared orders, but with his powers once more came the will of the kris compelling him to obey his owner.

Fumbling frantically for the magical dagger hidden in her dress, the beauty tremulously brought forth the wavy blade. The silver steel with the black engraving of his moniker glinted sharply in the wildly guttering flames as she pointed the tip towards the enraged fiend. If somehow he truly did find a way to break from her orders, he would not dare come forward without risking being stabbed by the kris.

Tears brooked in steady rivulets down her lovely cheeks in testament to the heart ache that wrenched inside. His strength could only do so much to harm her, but his words were those that cut deepest and slashed in her soul with poisoned steel. No blade or magic could halt the pain of a heart, not even the puissant magic's of the dagger.

"Don't come near me." She wiped away the tears with her sleeve, her watery eyes never leaving his cold own. "I love you; I wanted to be with you and now you do this? You want to kill me because you are turning into a man?"

His powerful, lanky form seemed to loom ominously in the dim lighting. Breath heaved laboriously from his scrawny body with the rage nurtured of deceit. "Your love is insignificant drivel compared to my power. I would rip out your throat happily before I surrendered an inkling of my magic's up! It's no contest, Dearie, my power means more to me than you."

Love, hah! Love would not protect him from those who sought to spill his blood and spit upon his corpse! Love would not keep him safe and alive and his life unending. Love would not have the cunning and resilience to bring his son back from a world without magic! Love would not make him strong, only weak and vulnerable again and that could not be allowed under any circumstance.

"No." She tossed her head stoically as the tears spilled freely upon the cold stone. His words were jagged arrows piercing her already failing heart. "No it doesn't."

"Have I ever lied to you, mistress?" Came the simple, acid refute; the final blow to her faltering soul.

For long, tenuous moments, which dragged by at a snails pace, the beauty and the beast stared at one another. Hatred glared at disparity; barbarity at sadness. Black and blue clashed and fought and questioned and mourned all within a few hearts beats.

A strange sound erupted from her throat as she cracked, unable to take the gaze that had only a few moments before been so full of love and affection. How could things have gone so wrong from a simple kiss? How could unabashed love be so carelessly tossed away as though her affection meant nothing?

She knew he was lying, somehow, someway, but why did not the kris make him speak the truth?

"You're a coward, Rumpelstiltskin. A lying coward!" Belle managed through her cracked timbre. Fist curled tightly over the dagger, she dropped the blade to her side as she backed away from him

With that, her raw, opened heart could take no more assault from his serrated words and burning hatred pinioned upon her like a brand.

Running towards the exit she gathered what she could of the heart he had ripped in half. The chill air cooled her hot, stinging tears as she raced away, leaving the one she had chosen in the darkness he was to afraid to leave.

~8~8~

Unrest shivered across the hearts of noble and servant alike as a chill wind throughout the palace of King Maurice. An ominous air seemed to linger about the lavish halls as though some foul whisper drafted through the currents carrying the news of a broken heart.

Sarah paced worriedly in a plush, rarely frequented parlor on the north side of the castle. All about her brown dust gathered on the exquisite pieces or art and normally she would have busied herself freeing the luxury from the trappings of grime, but not today of all days, not when her mistress could be making a disastrous error.

"Mrs. Potts, I came as soon as I got your note." Gaston revealed urgently as he slipped inside the gilded chamber. Concern flashed upon his ruggedly handsome face as he lightly shut the portal behind him and strode strongly into the dust ridden light. "Is something wrong with Belle?" He questioned immediately, his hand drifting down to the blade strapped at his hip.

To say the least he was surprised when one of his servants brought the deceptively small note to his chambers. He first thought the letter to be a message of absolute love from his bride to be, only to see the epistle was a dire plea for aid. In any other circumstance he would have disregarded the letter, but not from one so close to Belle.

The loyal maid averted her watery, worried gaze to a porcelain vase as she wrung her plump, wrinkled hands with the last inkling of indecision. "The matter is rather complicated, Sir." She revealed guardedly. Never would she give up one of her mistress' secrets, better she die of horrendous tortures than that, but there were other ways if she tiptoed carefully. At any rate, something had to be done in preventing her from tossing her life away.

"I believe Lady Belle might be under a foul spell." She explained warily, her voice barely raised above a whisper. "I…I think her beast might have something to do with this. He hates his captivity and I think he is trying to stir unrest amongst the noble houses."

That was the most reasonable explanation of course, Sarah remarked inwardly. With Belle refusing to marry the nobles would fight and bicker and war over the crown when poor old Maurice succumbed to the grave and went to join his beloved wife in the realms of twilight sun.

Never had the kingdom been without a couple when a new reign began. The pattern had always gone one royal to one noble. With the system out of order, their realm could fall into civil war and disarray thus sparking the chaos and revenge the fiend surely wanted!

Gaston's thick brow beetled into deep, stark lines about his face. "A spell?" He echoed dubiously and stroked his beardless chin. "Are you certain? Belle claimed she had her Beast under complete control."

"I never thought she had complete control, to be honest Sir." Sarah sniffed primly, as she normally did when gossiping to another maid. "One doesn't treat a creature as dangerous as he with such tenderness. She's been acting odd lately and has been loitering far to much down in those foul dungeons away from the watchful eyes of her guardian. He could have done anything to her."

A spark of fear flashed in Gaston's heart at the thought from the dedicated servant. If the Beast was not fully under control, then what havoc could it wreck upon him?

Had it simply been playing them the whole time, using Belle as a pawn? To what end, he pondered fitfully whilst trying to keep his panic under control, and furthermore how could he use such information, if true, to his advantage?

He frowned deeply towards the anxious muttering maid, his dark eyes searching her as he would a doe oblivious to his presence. "If what you say is true, Sarah, then we must act before any true ill befalls Belle." He grabbed her firmly by her plump shoulders, his glassy depths staring down to her hefty form in all seriousness befitting a knight with a knew mission upon the horizon. "You must tell me anything you can of this matter, and the Beast. Leave nothing out if I am to defeat it or see if my love truly is possessed by some charm. Has she told you anything of its powers or weakness; anything that could give us a clue?"

"Nothing I can remember, Sir. The Lady has kept secrets of the Beast close to her heart, not even divulging them to me." Sarah stammered with dread at the thought of time running out for her beloved mistress. Abruptly, her brow furrowed delicately at a thought almost tossed away. "Well there might be maybe one thing, but it could hold no value."

"What Sarah?" He nearly shook the corpulent maid by her rounded shoulders. His eyes blazed greedily with the thought of some delectable tidbit dropped to him. As a hunter, he knew even the faintest of tracks could lead to a beasts demise.

A thick finger tapped at her chin thoughtfully. "Well, when I first arrived back at the cottage after news of the war was over, I was terrified to see the thing in the yard. I screamed and Belle came running out of the hovel. A blade of some sort was clutched tightly in her hand. I remember it because it had the things name inscribed upon the steel. She sheathed it afterwards and mentioned something to me of control and that it wouldn't harm us, but I've never seen the blade again to be honest. That's the best I can tell you sir."

"A dagger?" Gaston shook his head. "She told me something about an enchanted stone that disappeared."

She had lied, the knight knew instantly. She had looked straight in the beautiful face of her betrothed and the sagging visage of her father and lied of the power to subdue the Dark One; no doubt to keep it all for herself.

The maid smoothed out her slightly disheveled baby pink dress with trembling fingers. "I don't know anything about a stone, Sir, but I did see a wavy dagger of some sort. I tell you, I've always personally made certain the mistress' room is clean as fresh fallen snow, but I've never caught a glance at that strange blade again. If its hidden, she's hid it right well."

"Thank you for all your aid, Sarah." He relented his iron grip and patted her shoulder softly. "I'll do my best to handle this quietly without causing distress to Belle if word gets out." Eying her curiously he questioned warily. "Does any other know of this matter? Have you divulged this information to her Papa?"

The maid shook her head resolutely. "No Sir only you. The king already has so much burdened upon him. I didn't know who to come to. You're her betrothed; you should know what to do." Abruptly her normal no-nonsense voice took on a tone of pitiful pleading. She clasped her tubby hands before her desperately. "Help her sir you are her only hope!"

"I'll do all in my power, Sarah." Gaston smiled widely. "Don't worry, Sarah, you've done your mistress well this day and perhaps saved a kingdom. I believe I know just what to do."

~8~8~

The tears still had not halted their painful trek down her porcelain cheeks when Belle burst into her inner most chamber.

Damp sopped the front of her blue cotton chemise and left an invisible trail of sorrow with every heavy, hurting step. Fortunately or by some luck of fate she had managed not to run into any servants that would demanded why their princess was weeping on her mad dash up from the pit where her love had been tossed back in her face as little more than befouled refuse.

Falling to her knees in front of the window seat, she sobbed unabashedly into the blue pillow.

She had given him all her love without protest, without reservation, and without fear of the plunge she took for him. Laying her heart down at his feet she had given him the one thing that she held precious to her, the one thing duty did not demand of her.

The beauty had made in her mind not to marry the man that had been chosen for her since birth and let her people down by shunning the marriage for love of Rumpelstiltskin. Even frightened she had accepted her fate to be outcast for her choice and banished with no where to call her home and he had tossed his love away as though it was nothing and she was nothing.

Perhaps she was truly nothing to him.

Of course she wasn't, Belle sobbed pitifully. How did she dare think a power man such as the Dark One would simply give up his powers for love, True Love? What a fool she was too think he truly could love her, some trivial little being who lived and died in a single blink of his eye.

Mortals were scurrying, witless ants to him; little flickers of flames that died out. When faced with a near unstoppable power how was a worthless woman from some backwoods kingdom to compare? She was no grand royal or wielder of magic. No, she was simply plain Belle with nothing to offer him he could not already have at the snap of his wiry talons.

She loved a monster and now she had been bitten when having gotten too near.

The acrid poison of a broken heart seeped through her veins, burning away any hope she once had. Any dreams she had once kept in the depths of her soul lay shredded before the bleeding, pulpy mass that was her heart.

Perhaps if he had returned her love she would have asked him to take her to his home, the Dark Castle. If she was still unable to free him without blood being spilt then at least he could be home in the icy mounts away from those that hated him.

In the brief, wondrous moment of the soft kiss, the beauty had dreamt of a life with him. Adventure, love, children perhaps, if such were possible between them and their relationship, all had flashed in her mind in the meeting of their lips.

Even when she saw what a miracle the kiss had wrought and thought the dark magic's to be vanquished, she dreamt of a quiet life with him. They could live in the cottage working the land and keeping to themselves in love till the end of their days.

They could have had happiness, if he had only believed that she could love him.

Sniffling, the beauty looked up in the pane towards the far distant land that was little more than a foggy line in her vision. How she wished to be away, to have never known the man who had crumpled her heart like worn parchment.

A gasp escaped her lips as she saw a grinning Gaston in the refection of the pane.

Before a word could slip past her lips he was upon her as a hound is upon a fox. His large hand wrapped about her mouth as he hauled her up into his arms from behind. Her body was flush against his as he held her in a tactile vice that was nearly impossible to escape.

Her pitched shrieks of outrage were muffled by his hand as she struggled and kicked and squirmed to no avail in his bulging arms.

"Easy, Belle, I'm not here to harm you." Gaston assured falsely as he pressed her back close to his body. His smiling mouth drifted to her ear in a clandestine whisper. "You lied to me, Belle; me your husband to be, in order to keep your Beast safe. I know about the dagger. Where is it? I don't think you're in your right mind now Belle, but I am trying to help you. If it's in the room then just nod. I'd let you speak, but I can't have you alerting the Beast."

While he was a master with a blade, he could do nothing against such foul powers if she summoned her monster to protect her.

At the mention of the Dark One the beauty could not help but veer her eyes away sorrowfully, but remained stoically silent and still of any movement. Even another speaking of him stabbed at her heart with blades of sorrow.

A malicious chuckle involuntarily stole from Gaston's lips to mask the ire of her rebellion. "What's the matter, Belle, had a falling out with your beast?" He shrugged carelessly. "No matter. If you will not tell me where the blade lies I can just as easily search; starting with you."

Belle shivered dreadfully as she closed her eyes tightly and staunchly endured his large, pawing hands groping about her body. His digits seemed to be everywhere, flitting across her skin with glee. Could this be the man she would have wed; a man who enjoyed 'searching' a trapped woman and grabbing at anything he could while at it?

"Here we are." The knight whispered victoriously as he found the hidden sheath in her dress. With a flick of his wrist he pulled the blade free.

His covetous eyes scanned the excellently weighed blade with a warrior's honed skill borne with a lifetime of being about weaponry. The blade was magnificent and could very well be used in combat with a deadly efficiency if it had come to that. "Very clever of you, Belle." He commended thoughtfully. "Who would think to look for a blade on an innocent maiden?"

"It's a fine weapon to be sure." He chuckled maliciously as he turned the blade in the slanting sun light. "But what is its purpose I wonder, how does one use it?"

She would never tell him, he knew instinctively. If Belle had nothing more in her body, she had a will no man could shatter.

Curling his thick, sword hardened hand tighter over Belle's mouth, he quirked his head slightly to the side as he looked over the fabulous knife once more. "Is this the full name of the monster? Rump…el…stilts…skin?

A chill slithered slimily down Gaston's spine as the name parted from his lips. The sheer azure curtains of the beauty's chambers rustled wildly with a foul wind that howled throughout her quarters.

Darkness crept into the room, like the presence of death. Only fear prompted by the sheer will of survival kept the knight from dropping the blade and his knees from shaking like leaves in a fierce wind.

In an instant the foulness was gone quicker than it came. Wrenching his gaze away from the dagger Gaston viewed the Beast upon its hands and knees before him.

Trembling in rage, the Dark One spoke through gnashed teeth. "You called, my master?" He asked furiously, his talons clawing murderously into the fine, burgundy carpet under him.

Staring down at the blade, and then staring up once more at the submissive Dark One, the knight's mind worked tirelessly to connect the dots now strewn before him as the riddle began to unravel.

In the few moments his thoughts took to iron out, he knew what had happened and the passing of power that was now his to wield. Belle kept the blade close for that was how he was controlled and now at his fingertips was a horrid, powerful monster that could conquer and slay and give him anything he ever desired all at a wish and whim.

Knowing without a doubt he now owned the Beast of nightmare and legend and unfathomable power, Gaston smiled.

The Beast was his at last.


	19. In Cruel Hands

_A/N: I've finally decided to put a cover page on! I hope it doesn't suck too badly :X. Thanks for reading and reviewing Lovelies!_

**~8~8~**

"The singular power to control the Dark One." Gaston's handsome reflection grinned maliciously in the flashing steel of the kris as he brandished the magical knife expertly in his weapon worn hands.

Rays from the blistering evening sun glinted from the dagger's razor edge sending a sliver of icy light to cross his awed and greedy features. "Such an odd thing to manipulate one so powerful." He observed in a thoughtful murmur.

After all his scheming to vie for control of the accursed monstrosity he finally had the one thing that would make the Beast his and his alone. Part of the knight could not help but chuckle sardonically at the delicious irony that lay before him. How utterly twisted that a dagger, the weakest of all steel, used only in times of desperation, could control the most powerful of creatures with naught but its name inscribed upon the blade.

Looking down at the bowing, enraged fiend, he cocked his head to the left inquisitively. Glassy, blue eyes searched creature with a cruel curiosity. "Tell me, Beast, is this truly all that it takes to control you; a simple kris in another's possession?"

"Yes, master." Rumpelstiltskin growled angrily, each word akin to a filthy curse spewing from betwixt his lips.

In his ancient mind, the Dark One's cunning thoughts were awhirl with turmoil and panic. How had the blasted knight uncovered the blade; how had he discovered his bane and the means of his absolute control?

When he first felt the magic summoning him, not of his own volition, he furiously assumed Belle had simply given him up to the brute in want of revenge from her broken heart. Bitterness, he knew well, was a powerful venom that over came the good sense of those infected with its poisonous bite.

His angered heart whispered vile, acrid words of hatred in the mere breath of a moment he knew that the power of the dagger had been transferred to another as not as kind as his mistress.

She wanted to see him hurt and brought low, the evil proclaimed in his bruised, sorrowed soul. He had hurt her and now she wished to harm him in turn by selling him over to one who would have no qualms in making his endless life hell.

Already the Dark One prepared himself to relate to her betrothed she had so freely given the dagger, how she had chosen her Beast over him. The seeds of discord would be planted in their hearts and he would watch as they fell apart.

Oh but how wrong his poisoned thoughts had been! Once the magic had dumped him upon the floor in Belle's chambers had his eyes been opened to see the truth the darkness in his soul attempted to veil.

The beauty squirmed tenaciously in the knight's powerful grip that captured her every move. Her body tried to wriggle free of his hold and clutch the magical dagger he now wielded. There had been no betrayal on her part to offering the kris to Gaston. On the contrary, it seemed the betrayal was induced by the hunter alone.

Seeing her caught in the bulging arms of her betrothed without a way of escape brought a savage, possessive fury to his dark blood. Rage leapt heatedly within his lanky form, stoked by flame of affection he denied so. How dare the brute lay his filthy pig hands on her!

His mind warred betwixt seething anger of nearly losing his powers because of her wanted love and the covetousness to keep her safe from the hands of Gaston.

The burn of magic twitched longingly in his scaled fingers to summon her out of the grip of her husband to be, but such could make the situation more perilous for all. For now she was in no direct danger though he cringed at seeing the battle calloused hand of the knight clasped in a vice about her face.

Coarse, grating laughter bellowed sonorously from Gaston's hulking form. Blue eyes narrowed cunningly down at the kneeling figure, he could not help but remember the wrongs the Beast had done to him. "You don't seem so dangerous kneeling before me, Beast. You should have treated me with more respect."

"Impossible, fools deserve no respect; you least of all." The Dark One remarked with a scalding savagery, unable to keep the disdain for the knight out of his tone. How he hated Gaston. From the first time he had clapped eyes on the burly waste of life and air, he had felt the tinges of jealousy prick his hide.

Anger flashed in a conflagration in the hard eyes of the nobleman. Tossing the struggling Belle to the side as though she weighed not an ounce, the furious knight marched towards the fiend with murderous haste. The muscles in his arms bunched in steel coils as he curled his meaty hands into hammer-like fists.

"You should learn to hold your tongue behind your lips." Gaston snarled down at the prostrate figure. Cursing the name of the fiend, he aimed a kick to the vulnerable Dark One's exposed ribs. "This should teach you some respect!" He landed another thunderous kick upon the sinewy body.

Rumpelstiltskin held back a cry of agonizing pain as the boot made contact with his bones in rapid secession. Dizziness and the temptation to lose consciousness whirled in his head with each collision to his leather attired form. Bones snapped like dried twigs under the intense cruelty of Gaston. The wielder of the blade could hurt him as though he were any other mortal.

A cruel grin slithered upon the brute's face which was already swathed with a devious glee. "What's the matter, Beast? Can't fight back?" He accentuated each word with a mighty kick to the vulnerable form of the Dark One. "No turning me into an ass now or humiliating me!"

"Gaston stop!" Belle cried desperately from behind.

Poised for another brutal kick, the knight turned about easily as though expecting her to intervene. With laughable effort he grappled her in his iron grip just as she lunged at him with nothing but her bare fist and a silver candle holder to combat him.

Tears burst freely from her cobalt orbs as she tried with all her power to fight the brute as best she could. Her fist, small compared to the knights, beat worthlessly upon him as he reflexively avoided the swings of the candle holder.

"Don't hurt him!" She threw her fist wildly, each punch missing its mark or causing no damage upon his chiseled chest.

Smiling amusedly, Gaston turned back to the now doubled Dark One. Black blood flecked the carpet and the monster trembled in abject torment. One hand was latched over his torso as though he were trying to keep his bones from shifting with every gasping breath.

Expertly grabbing both of Belle's delicate wrists in one calloused hand, Gaston huffed a cruel, boorish laugh at the futile attempt to halt him from garnering revenge on the Dark One. With a cruel jerk of his hand, he sent the candle holder tumbling to the carpet, leaving it to wobble precariously at their feet.

Staring darkly into her moist, icy eyes, he smirked evilly. "You are no longer in any position to give orders, Belle. I have the power now."

"Do you want him dead?" The beauty queried tremulously to dam her tears. Part of her was not certain if the Dark One could even be killed, but anything to save him from the merciless beating tumbled freely from her lips.

Conceding to her desperate words with a nod, the knight heaved his shoulders in a calloused shrug. "A fair point. Heal yourself if you can, Beast, I can't have you dead; I have things I want to accomplish."

Instantly, the sickly-sweet, pungent odor of magic wafted thickly through the warm air. Misty tendrils of the arcane in a deep damson hue coiled about the fiend to cure his ills and broken ribs with its powerful essence.

Coughing blood only once more, the fiend shakily hastened to his feet to avoid any other wayward blows. Lingering effects of torment etched across his face as he swayed slightly, his head spinning like a top.

"If that's done." Gaston began without turning towards the legendary monster. "I would like to make sure our little Belle here is of no more trouble to us." Pushing her away at arms length, he sneered nastily, but did not release her hands. "Make sure she cannot leave this room unless I allow it, Dark One. I don't want her getting in the way of things to come."

Standing tall, Rumpelstiltskin stared past his master to the beauty trying to restrain her tears. Pain and regret marbled her porcelain face in deep self loathing. Sorrow of an apology she did not dare allot to cross her lips flashed pleadingly in her azure orbs.

She blamed herself for his new captivity, the Dark One surmised on instinct. His former mistress thought his pain all her fault, when in reality none of the blame was to be laid at her feet.

Beastliness lurking inside warned him of the tiny sprout of compassion peeking through the foulness of his heart again. With a determined will, he crushed the seed of warmth he felt rouse within, reminding himself of how her trickery nearly became his undoing.

Snapping his black talons, the fiend nodded callously, his mind determined not to fall into the trap of her consuming eyes. "With pleasure, master."

He could feel nothing for her, he reminded himself inwardly. Belle was the enemy, making him feel things he should not feel. Coldness was to reign in his black heart once more, and that could not happen should she manage to worm her way through his barriers of ice again.

Magic brushed about Belle's porcelain skin in a faint pulse of sinister power. The magic would fetter her to her quarters, they all knew, leaving her without a way to even escape the castle.

"So eager to see her brought low, Beast?" Gaston chuckled darkly. His scarred fingers released her wrists and clutched her chin tightly. Forcing her to gaze deep into his gluttonous eyes he turned her head as though inspecting her. "He must have hated you to so quickly work his dark power." He mumbled aloud, though he spoke to himself. "I don't blame him really; I would hate you as well to know all my power was limited to the closed mind of some foolish woman who frittered away her time having tea than actually grasping the power before her."

Sapphire eyes, colder than the wailing wind atop a mountain peak, stared unafraid and solid, like pure wrought steel, at the knight. "I am the closed minded one? Let me make an educated guess what happens now; you marry me, take the kingdom, and get everything you ever wanted with but a word."

"Only partially true, Belle." He flicked a tendril of her dark amber mane from her face. A hated sneer pried at her lips with such a mockingly tender gesture. Laughing at her nerve, he continued casually. "With the Dark One literally in my grasp, I don't see the point of formality. I was to marry you for a sure bid to the throne and to marry one as lovely as I. Minutes ago you had much appeal to me and I thought perhaps I might have loved you. You are beautiful and rich and a princess, but now…" He shook his head and sighed deeply. "Most of you appeal is gone and that silly notion of love is shriveled and carried far away with the winds of power. Truly I have no need of you. I can have my perfect life without you or the title you carry. Perhaps we could have had a good life, but this power is so much more enticing than you will ever be. I think a part of me wishes it were different, but it isn't."

Stepping away, he nudged his head to the door as he began to depart. "Enough talk." Commanded the knight tersely. "Come Beast, I have things I need to see to with my new power."

Turning, not of his free will, Rumpelstiltskin began to follow behind his master like a beaten dog. Anger still roiled in his heart, and yet he cast a surreptitious glance at the beauty's direction. The will to race over to her and soothe her pleaded persuasively in his heart, but he tossed them away to dwell upon his coldness.

How dare she look helpless and sorrow laden! She was not a slave, she was not ordered about by a glutton for power that bore the name Gaston!

No matter what thoughts of compassion sparked in his soul, she was the one who tried to take his power away. Better Gaston wielded the blade than that, the darkness whispered to him.

"Traitor." The Dark One seethed behind clenched teeth before disappearing past the threshold.

Forcing himself to ignore the faint cry behind him, Rumpelstiltskin grimaced darkly as he trailed his new master. He could not dare to feel tenderness or pity or compassion. He had to be cold and uncaring to her to keep his life the way it had been for centuries, he had to.

~8~8~

A week of hell for the realm of King Maurice and the surrounding territories that had long been allies of the portly, aged monarch went by with each terrifying second the knight wielded the talisman that compelled the Dark One.

Neighboring realms fell into ruin and rubble with a flippant wave of the fiend's scaled claw. Homes were destroyed into smoldering heaps and livelihoods demolished upon salted earth as he worked the will of his master.

Any realm that did not resist their newly imposed leader Gaston was ordered to pay tribute with coffers heavy with gold. Those that decided to defy his claims to the crown were shown how cruel the strong man, people once thought a champion, could be.

Small, happy towns where people had done the most minor of slights were destroyed to char by the royal decree of High King Gaston. Everyday a new order was dictated by justifiably frightened messengers who touted the new laws of the land. If some dared mutter a singular complaint people went missing without a word of their departure.

Fear, where once peace had ruled, lorded the days that were now dark and filled with terror.

The peasants who once toiled happily in the fields of their peaceful realms worried daily over their lot. No one knew what had happened to the king or the princess or any nobles that dared support them or demanded to know of their whereabouts. All anyone knew for certain was that the magical monster known as Rumpelstiltskin was in the clutches of the champion Gaston who now claimed himself ruler.

Night was just beginning to fall upon the conquered realm of the seventh day of Gaston's rule. Dark, heavy clouds clustered angrily in the gray horizon as another horrendous day passed in the realms of King Gaston. Hovels and quaint cottages were locked up tightly, with every manner of light snuffed out in fear the glint of a flame might catch the eye of the prowling Dark One out by his masters bidding.

The heat of the sweltering day produced a relentless balminess that hung heavily in the torrid air. Thunder rumbled ominous in the barely lighted distance, telling of the pregnant clouds burdened with cooling rain driven by whips of silver lightening.

"My mission was successful, Master." Rumpelstiltskin confirmed with a faint nod as he appeared in the royal court of what was once King Maurice's palace.

The gilded marble court, once very tastefully lavish with its cream hued columns and patterned blue and gold floor was rather humble for a king's audience chamber. Now, the audience hall was a stark ostentatious sight that would turn the most gaudy, flamboyant eye with distaste.

Taxidermy trophies from Gaston's vast, morbid collection lined the columned walls like glassy eyed guardians unable to move or talk and yet still watched all souls in the room with hateful disdain, their bodies forever caught in their last moment of demise.

Strong drinks flowed like blood from a foes veins and music trilled on the nervous air by exhausted, but terrified minstrels who played for their very lives behind flowing curtains of silk.

Gaston lifted his greedy, red rimmed eyes from the rippling depths of his golden goblet which boasted only the strongest of swill. A foul smirk crossed his sodden features as he motioned a hand for the players to halt their tunes. "Avonlea is no more then?" The greedy knight inquired, his voice slurred.

"A pile of broken homes and ruined crops." Rumpelstiltskin clarified obediently, his scaled hands clasped before him submissively.

Swirling the dark wine in his goblet Gaston chuckled ruthlessly. "That should silence the rumors of rebellion quite efficiently. Let them have but a taste of what could truly happen if they sought to overthrow me." With a wry smile he added cockily. "Not that it would avail them much, would it, Beast?"

On an impulse, still on his high from absolute power, the knight laughed boisterously as though he had told a hilarious joke. Jamming the cup to his lips, he drained the chalice in one massive gulp. The burn was only mild, yet put him in a jolly mood added with the news of another town subjugated under his rule in terror of the Beast.

"You've done well for me, Beast!" He belched disgustingly, his voice resounding about the marble colonnades irksomely. Swaying, the knight managed to come to his feet from the plush throne. Raising his goblet in a toast, he stared drunkenly at the fiend. "This calls for something special!" Flippantly motioned to the Dark One with one hand, he beaconed to a trembling servitor awaiting in clandestine part of the throne room with his other form more drink. "Now, go into your lair and start spinning more gold! I'll think of something."

The Dark One bowed obediently, but not without a heavy, bitter dose of enmity and hatred for the brute. "As the master wishes." He replied soberly.

Snapping his spell clever fingers, he disappeared in a spurt of lavender hued smoke.

Relief that he was finally away for the day, from his volatile master, eased through his body, and yet he could not shake the words of the drunken lout.

Something special, Rumpelstiltskin scoffed darkly at the ridiculous thought as his body materialized like mist and then hardened to a tangible form in his cold, lonely lair. Stomping to his wheel where another load of straw awaited to be spun, he uttered a foul curse for his master under his breath. The only thing special the moron could do was drink himself dead and leave the dagger right on the floor!

As the wheel began its sharp, lonesome creak, his mind, as always, though it infuriated him, leaned towards the thought of his former mistress. With each spin of the spokes and straw transformed into wealth, her face flitted through her head in a whirlwind.

The darkness festering in his mind wished him to dwell on the kiss that had nearly damned him, but he felt his will always being drawn in a different direction of the hate that he told himself to have for her. Was she comfortable, had she been eating, did she remain mostly unharmed by his brute of a cruel master?

All worried thoughts of her milled through his mind with they hypnotic cycle of the wheel. For a week he tried dispelling her from his thoughts, and yet she clung like a limpet, refusing to let his angered heart be free though the ice tried to shut her out.

Perhaps he would have found a way to ask the ever loyal Sarah of her mistress' condition, but she had not been seen since the day he had lost his power and Gaston had taken away everything that could possibly aid him in his search.

At least, he hoped grouchily, as he pulled the shimmering golden strands through with pinched fingers, the traitorous woman was safe and hating him with the same fury he believed he had.

~8~8~

"Beast!" Gaston's heavily slurred voice echoed penetratingly about the conical spears of the Dark One's prison in the first lone hours of night.

Heavy footsteps pounded thunderously from the slimly stone stairwell as he scaled his way down into the ominous, dim dungeon of the monster.

A dark grimaces wrenched upon Rumpelstiltskin's worried features as the magic roused him from a fitful slumber. His straggly head lay tucked against his ever scrawny chest, and a piece of gold string still hung in his pinched talons as he sat upon the stool in front of his wheel.

Most nights his master had him at the wheel, until he couldn't keep his eyes open. Every night when he could no longer resist the temptation of repose he dreamed and always his dreams were of what would have happened if he had kissed Belle again.

Would she truly have not sought his demise? Would they have grabbed as much gold as they both could carry and simply run away from it all to be alone? Would she have truly loved the cowardly spinner beneath the gray-gold flesh who was bound to hobble the rest of his short, mortal life?

Some nights, when nightmares crowded and drove away his pleasant, misty dreams, he endured the fears that always crept in his heart. No, the darkness in him teased cruelly as it spun terrors from the dreams that were his only solace, Belle would take one look at the man that had so long been stuffed away like an old, forgotten rag. She would look upon him hunched and hobbling and laugh.

Anger never ceased to erupt in his heart at the thought of her turning away and leaving him a cripple down in the darkness.

"Beast to me a once!" The growling voice shouted out into the dimly lit caverns.

Rising tiredly, the Dark One stretched languorously, his back sore for so long laboring, as his feet stumbled on their own volition to meet the knight. As he neared the entrance where his master stood, his eyes snapped open in a stark alertness that brought heat to his heart.

All manner of sleep was tossed away at the pitiful sight standing before him. Belle stood submissively next to the sodden knight, her head bowed as though defeated. His grip wrapped tightly over her upper arm as though his hold was the only thinking keeping her on her feet. By the look of her, perhaps it was.

Her blue dress she had worn the day he had rejected her love was torn partially, revealing the creamy flesh beneath. The shredded fabric looked at though she had been in a tussle with a clawed creature. How the garb was even still on her slender frame seemed a miracle of itself.

Black and dusky purple bruises mottled her milky skin in a patchwork menagerie of horrors that set a righteous anger in the Dark One's heart. The marks were bestowed upon her by the drunken fists of Gaston and his thick iron fingers.

Never had he wished such upon her, even in his most furious. Seeing her battered and haggard, prompted rage and tenderness in his heart that had once more erected its cold, calloused shields. Warmth for her blazed in his soul, melting the frigid ice he replaced with his spirit.

Her wounds broke his fastidious shields into a million pieces quicker than anything magic could have wrought. Seeing the marks that dappled her flesh, his mind lay caught between turning away in callousness or screaming at Gaston to release her.

No, the sinister darkness whispered violently through his mind, he could not care; he must not care. And yet….

Swaying slight from side to side, a cruel smirk broke through the dark five o'clock shadow of his grizzled face. "After thinking long and hard on it, I decided she would be the perfect gift." Clutching her arm tighter, he thrust a grubby thumb at his chest and sneered hatefully. "See, Belle, this is what becomes of you when you reject a man like I. You refused my body so now I'm whoring you to my monster."

Turning to the Dark One, he perched a thick brow inquisitively. "You lusted for her at one time did you not?" Before the fiend could reply the knight waggled a finger at him and offered a slanted grin. "Don't lie." He commanded as though he need to remind the magic to keep his slave honest.

"I…I did." Rumpelstiltskin forced through barely parted lips. How could he deny what his heart had yearned for?

Gaston smiled triumphantly. "I knew it! You've wanted her since the first you've met. I know lust when I see it and I saw it in your eyes many a time." Satisfied he observation had been justified, he swiveled his head back to the beuaty at his side. His face neared her down turned head maliciously as acidic words hissed from his foul mouth. "Don't look so terrified Belle, this is what you wanted. Didn't you say to me not hours ago that you would rather be with anyone than me?"

With a hard shove, he sent the beauty tumbling to the cold ground at Rumpelstiltskin's feet. Her slender arms caught her from falling upon her face and barely supported her quaking body. Her thick chestnut mane curtained her down turned features hiding any emotion on her torn visage.

Laughing brusquely, the knight wiped his ale stained mouth with the back of his hand. "She's yours for the whole night. Do what you want but don't kill her. I won't be able to give her to you some other time if you do that!" He laughed roughly. As he turned away, he remarked casually to the trembling beauty. "Have fun with the monster that hates you Belle. There is no dagger to protect you; you're vulnerable now and within his grasp. Just remember when he's forcing himself upon you, I gave you a chance to avoid this."

With that, he slammed the door to the foul lair and departed to find more approachable women who would not scorn and toss their heads at him.

Belle visibly flinched at the dreaded bang of the door closing and her last hope of protection from the furious Dark One gone and careless of her fate. What little light from the surface gave closed off, wary rushed to subdue her.

Only a flickering flames from a nearby torch gave off light. From the cold stone she saw his shadow looming like a phantom of death over her mauled form.

Rumpelstiltskin hated her, she knew imperatively. Fear stabbed at her broken heart as she knelt there upon the cold stone awaiting her fate at his hands. The chill of his dungeons kissed against her skin with memories that hurt far more than Gaston's fists ever could.

How many hours had they lost talking and laughing and bantering in the darkness of his lair? How many cups of tea had passed between them in the morning and evening and any time she could bring the kettle down? How many meals had they eaten together and companionship they had forged?

Wincing, she dared not look up to see the murder and hate that surely glinted in his sable eyes as he knelt in front of her. No doubt he would try to work around Gaston's orders of ending her life. Already he had claimed the desire to slay her, why would he not try to find a way despite the command from the knight?

Abruptly, his lanky arms encircled her strongly though gently in the same instance. Body stiffening for some blow to surely be dealt, Belle felt herself, instead, being lifted up as though she were a feather in a child's cupped hands.

Though her body ached from the blows the knight dealt upon her slender body each time she refused to bed him, she did not mind the shift as he held her bridal style close to his chest.

Despite herself, surety enveloped her with a wave of warmth she had never known. Trembling fingers curled over his shoulder and her head rested against his chest as he carried her reverently through the darkness. The cold could not assail her from his protective grip and even the dread of his lair failed to induce fear with him so near.

For what seemed like a millennia to the beauty he strode with careful step between the fanged pinnacles of the caverns, never once breathing a cross word or even radiating the malice he had shown a week ago.

His body seemed in battle; some will combating another that raged fiercer than any war of mortal flesh could.

Her eyes fluttered, heavily with the first sleep she felt wash over her in seven long, tortuous days. Blissful repose nearly overwhelmed the beauty, until she felt him stop his somber trek.

Belle flinched again in his arms as he halted. The thoughts of peace were decimated once more with the thoughts of revenge he most certainly had in store. He wanted the beast in him out and livid to cut off what they had once had. Surly he must wish revenge for nearly obliterating his powers.

"Don't be afraid." The Dark One soothed lowly as though sensing her trepidation.

Delicately, the fiend placed her on his bed of furs as though she were some fragile trinket made of sea glass. His wiry talons smoothed gently over her porcelain skin as though trying to dictate the feel of flesh to his ancient memory.

In all his centuries never had he missed the touch of skin as he had in the seven days he let his hatred brood darkly beneath his flesh. How had he allowed this happen? Why did his heart yearn for her and yet his power loathed her? How could his evil truly love her goodness? And how, how in all his long life, had one woman not once, but twice, break the icy carapace of his black heart as she did now?

No matter how many walls and lies he erected to barricaded her away, in one moment, seeing her so miserable and broken he had succumbed to the tenderness he wished so to deny.

"Belle, my Belle." Rumpelstiltskin muttered agonizingly as he knelt beside her.

Summoning all her courage, the beauty forced herself to find his eyes. Stinging tears of abject remorse and regret poured steadily from his fathomless ebony orbs. Gray-gold flesh shimmered in the pathetic flicker of flames with the brook of tears that coursed down his scaled features.

Neither spoke, and yet both knew so much was said as their eyes met. No matter what words departed past his lips, he cared for her, and would always care. His darkness could not blot out the love she tendered in him.

Wordlessly, as though proving the silently revelation, he outstretched his dexterous claws. Lilac magic tinged his talons as he mended her contusions one by one with the most delicate of hands.

Warmth filled her wretched, pained form as he administered his power to mend flesh and restore her health. In moments the magic flitted away as smoke upon the wind with his Belle cured of all bruises.

Finding his eyes once more, a saddened smile tugged at the edges of her pink mouth.

"Rum." She managed in a whisper.

Stroking her cheek with his knuckles, he sighed softly. "Belle."

She was hurt because of him, he knew. Perhaps the worst hurt came about because he had thrown her love back in her face and even now he could see her refusal to truly believe he hated her and did not love her with the same fervency in her soul.

There was so much he wished to speak in that moment; so much that needed to be let free in the open, so many explanations that needed to be given, and so many promises to whisper.

Instead, the Dark One turned his head away too ashamed to look in the open eyes that once expressed love for him. How could she even bear to look at the monster which shunned her most raw of affection.

"I am sorry, Belle." He choked sorrowfully as the words and thoughts he had tried to kill sprang from his thawed heart. "So, so sorry."


	20. Escaping Darkness

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals! FF was being a baby bear this morning, not letting me log in. If you are having the same trouble loggining in I have written on the forums about it. _

**~8~8~**

A pale, wane smile curved Belle's lips as she lifted her leaden hand to the Dark One's bowed head. Her warm palm rested flush against his cold gray-gold flesh, suffusing his skin with heat that denied the ice from resurfacing in his black heart.

He could not bring the ice back even if he desired to when his feelings came to Belle. She had roused spring to bloom in his winter of soul and he would never let the ice cull his ardor for her again. Seeing the beauty hurt and beaten broke his will to deny the love he felt under the shell he plated over his heart.

Tears rimmed her startling blue orbs with a shimmering radiance that revealed a love that hard, harsh words and insurmountable hate could never dampen for long or cheat her into thinking her affection a mere fancy. Love, though frail, could not be slain so easily and did not die so quickly even as a thousand arrows pierced it.

"It's alright now, Rum." She soothed tenderly and stroked his cheek gently, her words little above a whisper in the chill lair.

Weakness lay heavily like thick winter blankets upon her healed form, depleting the miniscule amount of energy she had managed to sequester away from the huge, bludgeoning fists of Gaston. Sluggish movements reigned with every hesitating motion she could accomplish and every breath seemed an effort.

The Dark One tossed his straggly brown hair. "No it is not." He rebuffed hoarsely. Pain hitched tightly in his throat as guilt lashed his already wounded, bleeding hearts without clemency.

Curling his wiry talons over her delicate hand he held on with the desperation of a drowning man seeing a helper come to pluck him up from a perilous swamp. He had been drowning, he knew imperatively, drowning in a foul morass of darkness and hate and vengeance, and she, wonderful, beautiful Belle, offered him rescue and in return he plunged back into the murky muck.

"Had I not been so angry and cowardly when I saw what the kiss was doing to my curse none of this would have happened." His thumb absently traced the pallid skin along her knuckles comfortingly. "You would not have been harmed, I would not find myself a slave of a power-lusting brute, and I could have saved us both heartache; so, so much heartache."

Gaston might have been responsible for her wounds on the outside of her graceful figure, but he had hurt her in the soul, a place where magic could not mend ills and words were not punches to be blocked or parried by force. Had he hurt her more with his lies and his rabid threats to break down her notion of love? Some foul part of him feared he worse than Gaston.

Swallowing nervously, his bottomless ebony depths sparkled with undeniable shame. He did not dare stare again into the eyes of one so lovely he had tried to hurt with his snarling beastliness and forked tongue.

"I think…it's…its time I told you the truth about me, Belle, what I am, what I was. I owe you that much at least. Then you may really see the Rumpelstiltskin buried so long behind this beast." He fought the fetid darkness down within that roared in rage upon his declaration to reveal what he truly was beneath his quips and scales and power.

The blackness in him abhorred weakness and no one was weaker or more pathetic than the man once teased as Hobble-foot and treated as a lesser by all who knew his tale. Magic wished to erase that Rumpelstiltskin, but he could never completely shed his old self like a serpent discards its skin. The darkness had made do with burying the fearful knave so deep that primal beastliness was the only thing left to rule in lieu of the cripple.

"You would give me such an honor?" Belle queried humbly, touched he would choose to freely share his life's journey to being the master of magic.

Surely to know what lay in the milky fog of the Dark One's past was a tale few had ever heard truthfully or would have believed had it been real. Wild rumors often swirled about legendary folk of good or ill, but to know the beginning, the foundation that built who they were, was a thing remarkably astounding and a rare gift offered to those they trusted in the deepest sense.

The fiends laughed softly, the noise hollow and mirthless as he shook his head dourly. "It is no honor. It is a tale of cowardice and murder and pure evil. You will find no happiness in this history."

"If you are willing to entrust me with such a story then I would already be happy to listen." Belle remarked stronger than she had previously been. The magic which he had bestowed upon her was adding strength anew to her minded body. Slowly, bit by mortal bit, her stamina was rejuvenating in her form.

Patting the somber hued furs gently she offered a warm smile. "Will you lay here with me? It's cold and you're always so warm."

Of course she could have asked for warmth to fill the dungeons, for heat to coil from the very stone, but to openly wish him closer, as she had dreamed many a night, was a request she dared to entreat. Love had been renewed in her soul to know his words had been denial, and that his affection was as real as her own. Come what may, she would not avoid and dodge her outspoken feelings as she had done when deciding between him and Gaston.

The time for insecurity had passed from her heart. She loved Rumpelstiltskin and she would let him know with more than mere words she was comfortable with his talons and toad skin and fathomless obsidian depths.

Shock and wariness marbled flagrantly upon Rumpelstiltskin's face. She wanted him to be closer than he already was after all he had done? How could she even stand the sight of him without cursing his name, let alone ask for him to be near?

Amazingly, as though his heart was a loadstone, coaxing him near, the fiend felt himself lay down upon the soft furs. Tension wound upon his nerves like spring awaiting her one word or look of discomfort to make him leap away a proper distance. Blood galloped like wild horses through his veins with each moment so close. His lanky form laid a hand span from her body, but still he felt as though no amount of distance would be enough for him to feel comfortable.

Belle, brazen and brave, closed the small gap betwixt them. A clandestine smile etched her pink lips as she could not help but notice his flagrant nervousness. His eyes were as wide as black moons and his body was stone still as though not daring to move least he disturb her comfort.

Her body cuddled close to him as though waiting to divulge a secret. Head on his shoulder she perched her eyes up inquisitively, searching him as though she read words beneath his skin. "Thank you. I'm ready to listen, if you've not changed your mind."

Perhaps, the beauty feared inwardly, he succumbed to second thoughts. Why would he tell a mortal woman anything? Why should he speak of his past woes that forged him into the man with gray-gold scales?

"I have not always been the monster you see before you." Rumpelstiltskin began hesitatingly as though speaking a foreign language he had just learned. Dabbing his dry lips to find a moment of courage he fought through the darkness screaming deep in him to be away from her, the woman who melted the ice, the flaw in his otherwise impenetrable armor.

With a dull flourish of his black talons he gestured to his leather attired body. "Once I was a man, but not a whole one. I was a cripple of my own making in order to leave my kings army. I was a cowardly, scrawny husk of a man who made bad decisions and lived in fear like any true cur. I had a wife who could not bare the abject shame of being yoked with a coward who quailed in the face of war and maimed himself to leave. She abandoned me and my son to run away with a pirate who offered me a chance to win her back, but once again I was a coward and she left me and my son." Sorrow and hatred for his former wife tinged his timbre as he continued bringing up the old wounds he had tenaciously tried so hard to forget. "I had to tell my boy and the villagers his mother was dead in order to keep that shame from being burdened upon my son's back." Pain gouged the Dark One's features as though reliving the past once more. His fathomless orbs seemed like a cloudy midnight sky as his voice drifted off into silent repose.

A sorry nearly broke past Belle's pink lips at the hurtful admittance his related from the depths of an ancient heart, but she bit her tongue and clamped her teeth stoically. Pity would be the last thing he desired, especially from her.

His thin lips pried into a hateful sneer as his hands curled into tight fists that pronounced his rage. How he hated to recall those times when he lacked power and strength, when he bobbed along on the side of the road, making way for children who threw sticks at him and cringing at brave me who looked down upon him with unabashed disgust. Fury stoked in his heart like prodded embers stirring reawakened with a new life. He had hated who he was.

Seeing his blistering fury rippling under his glimmering skin, the beauty placed a hand upon his chest to comfort the pain the memories aroused.

The tenderness of her touch was akin to water being doused over a roaring flame. Her sincerity for compassion and want of understanding quenched the burn smoldering in his heart. No other had been able to tame his fury so, no one save her.

"Your compassion would be better suited for another; some one worthy." He frowned dourly, his voice bitter and humble. "I slew my unfaithful wife years later; goaded by anger and hate for abandoning my son and I." A scoffing laugh erupted insipidly past his lips. "But that is not the worse sin I fear. I lost my son to my lust for power. My son, Baelfire, found a way to take us to a place where my magic could not eat me alive. It was a land without magic. But…I…I…" Regret and a pain no balm would ever soothe twisted his heart. "I went back on our deal, like the coward I will always be. I lost him after letting him go as he was sucked into the heart of the portal. And now I have spent centuries trying to right my wrongs. Belle what you see before you, is exactly what everyone else knows I am - a beast. I am a thing who gave up his family for power; that is not a man. I can't give up my magic because I am a cowardly beast through and through."

A dreaded silence reigned after the hard words of admittance departed from his lips. Truly now she could see the filthy, cowardly scum she had offered her vaunted love. Now she knew the man behind the legend was no more than a cripple and a coward beneath a devious fiend who grasped at his power for he was far to afraid to lose it.

The fiend tensed involuntarily as a sigh tumbled from her mouth. Was she disappointed, disgusted, terrified, a mixture of all three? How could he have thought otherwise, he asked inwardly, his thoughts bitter as bile. There was a reason beasts and cowards and monsters were not loved.

"I understand now." Belle whispered at length, her words sober and melancholy. "I can at least say that, and this as well; I know you are a devious man, I know there is malice that festers like a plague in you and anger that nothing could subdue. There are many things now other women would do, but I find myself unchanged of me feelings. I know you feel remorse for all the ill you've done and I know that Rumpelstiltskin is and can be a good man if he but had courage in himself."

A thin smile donned his lips as he shifted somewhat. "You think too highly of me. I am far undeserving of understanding after what I did to you."

"I do not know what made you say those things to me, but I had already forgiven you in my heart." The beauty revealed promptly. Curling in closer to his warm skin, she allowed herself a moment of utter bliss at his side. "Nothing could make me stop loving you." She promised in a whisper.

His brow furrowed in thin crevices upon his odd skin as he looked upon her. "How can you possibly forgive, or even stand me after all I did?"

Why was she not asking for Gaston to punish him more? Why was she speaking her heart as though cruelty had been nothing? He had hurt her, and any he usually hurt sought revenge and death to him, but not her.

"Love conquers all." Came her gentle, almost laughing reply. Loving the Dark One was no mean feat, but she happily took on the task and the rewards were sweeter than the finest of wines.

"But your love is a love that I cannot match in return." The fiend replied in a melancholic retort. "To love you fully, how you deserve to be loved, I would have to give you all of me, and that I cannot do; not now, maybe never."

Belle shifted her head from his shoulder to his chest. A smile alit her face as she tapered her fingers against his brown, leathered tunic. "No not yet, but it will come. I won't deny there is pain in my heart, but I know why you will not relinquish your magic. Perhaps one day you will, but I shall be content until then, and will not try to kiss you. As long as there is an inkling of good in you, I will keep my peace with you…if…if you decide not to banish this notion of love once more."

Oh how she prayed he would not cast her away again, though now he could not deny his love. How her heart pleaded he would not decide she was to dangerous and distance himself. Part of the beauty thought her heart could not bear being bereft of his affection again.

Guilt and remorse washed the Dark One into a sea of resurfacing emotions of goodness Belle always managed to lure out of the beast. His claws lightly skimmed over her skin in awe. She was willing to wait for him, to endure his foul magic to be by his side. Her words offered him a bright ray of light he never thought would break through his blackness. Given all he had done she was still willing to love him.

She _loved _him.

Truly only a real love could garner such resolve that defied all sense and odds. Laid before him was a second chance, a rare thing he had not been given much of. Did he dare take hold and cloister it away least the opportunity be gone and leave him in darkness and the torment of soul for the rest of his days?

"I love you." Rumpelstiltskin announced abruptly to the beauty. His words tumbled out in the most sacred of oaths to the woman who bound herself upon his heart. "And as long as you refuse to give up on me, to not shun me as the rest of the world has, I will work towards the goodness only you see in me. I will stumble in the dark to find it, but I will try."

Tears welled in her eyes at his proclamation. Already he showed a hint of progress, a willing to be rid of the darkness so long that had claimed him if she but filled the void with her light. "That is all I ask." She stroked his scaled cheek tenderly, nary even shivering at his gray-gold flesh. Abruptly, the light in her face clouded once more. "And yet I fear we have another matter to resolve; one we have to face as soon as possible - Gaston."

Gaston. The moniker, made the Dark One grit his sharp black teeth in abject fury and anger to alight in his heart once more. After what he had done to Belle, he wished to rip the knight's jugular out with his teeth and offer his beaten corpse to Belle as a gift.

"My heart broke to see you in the arms of that foul cretin, and I could do nothing to help you." He admitted hoarsely to his love. Sighing, the Dark One placed his rigged forehead against hers. His eyes screwed shut to stave away the sting of tears. "Only once more in my life had I felt so helpless as I did then. When I lost my son, I felt the same powerless dread overtake me and still it has never left me."

Belle shifted slightly upon the comfortable furs, wriggling deeper into his arms. "It had to be done; I had to get down here to see you. Gaston thinks you hate me, and would have tormented me or worse. The blows were a small price to pay to at least talk to you once more. I would hate to leave you in this captivity without even trying."

Taking the fearsome blows had not been something she would do again, but each had been another plot and plan with but the hope they could find some way to slip under Gaston's radar. Despite the knights usually averseness to tactics and plans he was cunning when it came to the blade and his new found slave.

The dagger remained in a sheath stitched right into the chest of his shirt. When he slept his arms were always folded and not an hour went by he did not finger the hilt of the cold steel. Fearful servants who attended him claimed that even in his sleep he would touch the blade and would slay any soul that came without a foot of his bed.

"You intentionally angered him in hopes he would bring you down here." Rumpelstiltskin concluded in a troubled murmur. How desperate had she been to endure the brutes torture just to perhaps discover a plan to usurp him.

Belle turned her head away hiding the pain of the memory of his fists. "I thought, hoped, rather, that even if you did hate me we could strike some accord. I don't want to see you in his clutches, Rum. Better I give my life up to try than to know you would be forever his slave."

Touched, the fiends dared to wrap an arm about her shoulders and pull her closer. Face buried in her thick mane, he sighed almost contentedly. "How can you still be so kind to an old monster?"

After all he had wrought, of all the mistakes how could she still think to freely give him her precious love and even risk her own body to emancipate him?

"Because I love the man the monster tries to hide." Belle laughed softly in reply.

Sobering, she smiled slightly. "I hoped we could work through some sort of plan. Anything is better than letting Gaston keep the dagger another night and plot in his head. Who knows what evil he will plan tomorrow or the day after that." She commented sagely, her voice just barely laced with urgency. "We must stop him as soon as possible, before he does something disastrous."

For a moment the Dark One fell silent, as though debating with himself, before speaking once more. "There is…there is one plan I have held close since I first became your servant." He commented in little above a surreptitious whisper as though Gaston lurked in the shadows awaiting to hear his ploy. "I will not deny it is perilous. It involves an old friend that could be more dangerous to call for aid than to simply leave alone."

Belle cocked her head slightly to the left. "Why did you never act upon this plan to get the dagger from me?"

Surely he had more than one opportunity to call upon this friend in attempts to nab his dagger back again.

"When I learned more of you, I quickly tossed that plot away." He chuckled and brushed a rebellious tendril of hair from her lovely visage. "You're intelligent, Belle, I would not dare risk you both in the playing field going head to head; one of you would have been bound to kill the other and that could not be allowed."

"I see." Belle replied quietly with a slight nod. "But if this person is so dangerous how do you know they'll help?"

The fiend heaved his shoulders in a tiny shrug. "It's a risk, but hopefully I have something they want. It could just as easily land me in a worse state than I already find myself, but at least we must try. Gaston sets his sight for more land that is not his and plans to have people who've done him a slight disservice punished in morbid ways. "

The beauty stared at her love thoughtfully. "If this person is so dangerous is there a chance…"

"This might go terribly ill." He finished for her dourly. Sighing he nodded slowly in affirmation to her worry. "I will not lie, Belle, this could very well end up with both our heads on pikes or at least me in the thralldom of another far worse than Gaston. I thought myself cunning enough to handle you, but for this there can be no time for drawn out plots; we must act fast. I must not leave so you must be the one to relate this plea for aid"

So far Gaston had not done something completely ruinous but one ill fancy could spell havoc and chaos and mar plans that had been worked now for centuries.

Silence filled the dark, frigid caverns at the dread revelation. Both held one another, breathing in tandem as they listened to the faint wail whistling through the dungeon like the souls of those long dead.

No freedom could be obtained if they did not risk all. There golden opportunity had sprung with Gaston's foolishness and his want to see the woman who rejected him hurt in the worst possible ways. He had dragged her down into the fetid lair with the hopes of seeing her bruised and shaking with blood sopping her skirts from the Dark One's forcing himself upon her, not healed and untouched. When he was sober he might see the folly of his ways and they would never come across another chance.

A deep, stalwart sigh crossed Belle's lips. Her hand curled into a tight fist atop his chest. Words tumbled tremulously from her lips. "Is there a chance I will never see you again, if we do this?"

"A great chance." He remarked flatly, though his sable eyes flashed with fear and remorse of putting her so close to peril. "There is a chance you could be killed on sight or worse. I cannot direct you, and most of what you say will be to convince them to not slaughter you and aid me. "

His heart clenched at the thought of never seeing her beautiful face again, to never feel the softness of her milky skin, or hear the laughter that brought a blazing light to his soul that penetrated the foulest darkness.

Closing her eyes tight, resolution welled within the beauty. Better she be dead than to see him enslaved and know she had done nothing. Better to unfetter her love, than live with the remorse of how she watched Gaston darken the world.

"Then before you give me instruction there is one thing we must do." She shifted abruptly, taking the fiend off guard.

In half a hearts beat, the beauty lay upon his body. Parts of her milky, porcelain skin lay flush with his gray-gold flesh as though always meant to be so close. Eyes of the deepest azure glimmered like faceted sapphires upon her face.

The Dark One lay as though helpless, and perhaps he truly was with her so wondrously near. Blood stilled in his veins like water flows overtaken by ice. Breath stoically refused to leave his body or enter his lungs.

"Gaston threw me down here for a foul purpose." Belle explained gently, her tone like silk to the fiend's ears. "I knew you would not harm me in such a way, even at your very angriest. But now…I know there is much to be done, but please, if we may never see one another again, let me know you. If this be my last night let me remember it as the night entangled with my love."

Rumpelstiltskin shook his head in utter amazement, unable to believe the words that entered his brain and set his blood aflame. Perhaps none of what was before him was real, he considered with a small portion of his mind not entranced in wonderment at her desire ad behest.

Perhaps he would awake and he would still be sitting at his spinning wheel and the dream this surely must be no more than a fog in his mind gone. And yet she was real, so, so real and soft and sincere.

Finding his voice again, his normally tittering timbre sounded cracked and human and strangely hoarse. "You cannot wish for this. After all I have done, after all that I am…. You will find another, better, to offer such a precious gift, but not to me. There is no doubt you will find someone far worthier than I."

"I wish it to be you, Rumpelstiltskin." She laid her head in the crook of his neck. His pulse leapt erratically under his skin. Daring a kiss to his throat she whispered against his flesh. "If this could be the last night we share, then I want it to be with you. My choice will always be you. No one will ever have what I give to you now."

Astounded, he felt his instincts thaw his blood with heat. She was sincere, he new instinctively. She stared deeply into his eyes, her azure own engulfing his vision and leaving nothing but here in his heart and mind. This woman who had dared love him then refused to banish such affection after he had so callously rebuffed her ardor did mean to be with him and give her virtue, something so precious and rare, to him an unworthy monster.

Averting his eyes he could not help but feel touched. "Why me?" Why a Beast and a monster and a thing shunned by all those with good hearts?

"Because I love you." She smiled through happy tears. "And you will forever be the only one I love."

~8~8~

Remorse and a longing to be near the Dark One surged through Belle's heart as she exited the portal her love had erected for her use. She would have to be quick, they both knew for the hour drew late after they had found themselves in a world of passion and heat and bliss only true love could create.

They enwrapped themselves with love and enraptured the emotions that raced through them. Every touch and move had been glorious and she had found herself crying out his name as though telling the world to who all her love went.

After there love had been sealed and he explained his plan, she loathed to leave the sheer softness of his bed and the warmth he radiated to her whilst he enveloped her in his arms. The world seemed so small and simple as she lay beside her love.

That's how things would be, she promised herself as she redressed and went over the plan again, if they survived being free of Gaston, she would awake every morning in her Rum's arms and be happy.

Tucking the highly pleasant thought away, the beauty fumbled inch by inch through the dark of the place Rumpelstiltskin had sent her. Secrecy would avail her not, he had told her, for the person he sent her for aid would most certainly know of her presence the moment she set foot in a place she did not belong.

Blistering light abruptly illuminated the dark room with a blinding radiance that stung Belle's eyes. Pain pierced her sapphire orbs as she covered her face with her arms to block out the stinting rays searing into her brain like daggers.

"Who are you?" A sharp voice asked indignantly through the white haze. The click of heeled shoes rapped a steady tempo all about her. "How did you get into my tower room?"

Foul magic brushed warningly about Belle's skin like a nearby predator awaiting to greedily gnaw into flesh. Goosebumps arose on her flesh, telling the tale of peril so close nearby.

"I bring a message from Rumpelstiltskin!" The beauty stammered hurriedly to avoid the stabs of dark power no doubt aimed toward her slender frame.

"The Dark One?" The voice sounded slightly surprised and mildly intrigued.

The power about the beauty lessened by a hair, as though the name took the voice off guard. As Belle's eyes began to adjust in the room, her eyes fell upon a woman all in lacy black.

A ruby smirk etched her full lips as she searched her intruder intrinsically with cunning eyes of a hawk.

Remembering the warning her Rum had told her, she dipped a low, humble courtesy to avoid offence. "You must be queen Regina."

Harsh laughter barked from her lips as she dissipated the lethal magic like some fanned away with a hand. Shaking her head, she padded closer to the beauty. "Of course I am, girl." The monarch scoffed as though it should have been obvious. Looking the beauty up and down, a small sneer of disgust traced her lips. "Now just what does my old teacher want…?"


	21. Help

Silvery light from undulating, glowing orbs hung from the rafters and illumed the stony, oval room of Regina's tower chamber. Macabre shadows clung to the walls the mass-less light could not touch like looming vultures huddled along the rim of the room. The dark, glossy marble of the floor reflected the fluttering flames with a startling clarity. Tattered scrolls written with anathema and dark books of the forbidden arcane lined the flaking walls in their own little cubbies gouged from the stone; waiting to be used for sinister devices.

A large oaken table sat dead center upon the marble floor akin to some heathen altar awaiting a morbid sacrifice. Faded maps and leather bound ledgers cluttered the ancient, polished wood as that the contents seemed on the fringe of tumbling to the ground with but a firm gust of wind.

A sly, shrewd grin played upon Regina's scarlet lips as she fully entered the towers pinnacle. Her form radiated a sense of tranquil ease and assurance she did no at all feel stir within. Surprise was not a word the queen enjoyed to hear, especially when that surprise had Rumpelstiltskin involved in some way.

Astonishment had seized the fair monarch when she realized another soul had entered her private quarters were she dabbled in magic and brewed her own mediocre concoctions. Snow White was the first culprit in her mind, but then again she relished to meet with her enemy and attempt to end her horrid life. Joy filled her heart to have the thorn in her side in the heart of her kingdom to be destroyed and she had made all haste to her tower. Instead, she'd clapped eyes on a copper haired beauty with a message from the Dark One.

Though the monarch traipsed about with austere, dainty dignity of that of any royal born, to Belle the famed witch seemed more a cunning lioness slinking through the grass to near her wary prey.

Oh she was a dangerous one indeed.

Insincere laughter fell from her painted mouth as she smiled wickedly at the beauty. "You have a message from Rumpel? What has that imp been up to nowadays, hmm? No one has seen hide or hair of him in many months around these lands. I had almost begun to believe he had forgotten this part of our world and went to go dabble in other realms affairs for his amusement."

Long months ago he had been slithering around consistently, popping up when he most certainly was not wanted, and causing havoc by tampering with things of mortal device. His presence had almost become routine in a sense and then he had simply halted his clandestine visits as though vanished from the face of the world.

Jefferson claimed he could not locate the fiend, so where or what had the scaly toad been plying his hands to? Questions whirled madly through the sorceress's mind, but she maintained the easy, feigned smile of complete clam and control.

"We haven't much time." Belle explained to the prim woman garbed in lacy black and reeking of sinister power. Forcing her voice from trembling she made herself appear urgent, but calm. "The Dark One needs aid."

"Aid!" The queen blurted an involuntary chuckle at the sheer absurdity of the notion. Desperate people of noble or peasant rank called upon the nefarious Dark One for aid, not the other way around.

Magic heavily tinged her black gloved fingers as her laughter died away as mist in the summer's sun. Her mouth became a thin red line of incredulity and impatience. "I don't know if this is a ruse, but rest assured if it is your consequences will be dire." She spat easily. "Speak quickly and if you words are true, you just might live. What sort of aid does he need exactly; what game is he playing at now?"

"Rumpelstiltskin is trapped." Belle began; her voice hinting with relief the vile monarch had not transformed her into a roach or a rat just yet. One hurdle had been leaped, though there were taller ones to scale coming along in her frantic pace.

Brazenly striding over to the heavily carved table, the beauty began to shift through the maps hurriedly as she explained to the dubious witch. "A cruel man named Gaston has taken the Dark One thrall. Rum has no choice but to obey his every command." Rifling through the sheets of aged yellow parchments, she gratefully found one that could aid.

The map was an old one, perhaps even older than her father. The edges were frayed and the once gaily painted lines of trade routes and wagon trails were dulled and the colors insipid and fading into the yellow vellum.

Spreading out the map as best she could upon the cluttered table, she pointed to a gray pained city miniature. "Gaston lives there where King Maurice once ruled. He now calls himself High King and forces the Dark One to do his dirty work. Everyday he sends Rumpelstiltskin out to do his bidding and quell uprisings and dole out vengeance."

The Dark One captured, Regina repeated almost unbelievingly in her malicious mind. Her jade eyes stared intensively upon the map as her mind spun. Was the girl insane or simply trying to pull off the world's most fabulous jesters joke? But then, how had she bypassed all her carefully constructed wards into her tower with naught but child's ease breaking through a cobweb and seemed to know the Dark One personally?

Regina's pallid brow beetled dubiously, her eyes flashing with unabashed suspicion. "Why should I believe a word you say?" She stalked closer to the beauty, a lioness ready to pounce and maul at a moments notice.

"Can you risk not to?" Belle parried as she let the map free. The paper snapped back into a roll and tumbled to the marble but neither paid heed to the wobbling parchment. Staring courageously into Regina's teal eyes she posed another inquiry. "Will you truly take the risk of thinking me mad and let a man who controls the Dark One wanders about unchecked? His ownership of the Dark One is foul for everyone. What if decides to turn his sights on all you've built?"

Gaston had made it no secret he was bitter for Regina not sending aid in the ogres war. Often he groused after a bloody battle of how the war could be won and the ogres vanquished if the queen had but sent one legion to crush the marauders.

"I would still be a fool to trust you without confirmation from the Dark One. What if this is a trap? Surely you do not think me so foolish to simply call to my soldiers and march away to this city at first light?" The queen replied succinctly, her tone sharp as a thorn.

If she did believe the girl at a whim so many things could go wrong in so little time. Snow White could try to sneak in and lock her out of the kingdom, she could be ambushed, or even the Dark One could be toying with her simply for his tittering giggles that infuriated her so.

Coldness whisked about the ominous room causing Belle to shiver unpleasantly. Goosebumps prickled her porcelain skin and her breath misted before her eyes. Now above all times did she wish her Rum was near. He could have easily dealt with the witch, were she was all but floundering.

Nodding to concede Regina's fair point, the beauty rubbed her cold arms in the process. "He is willing to compensate you for your aid." She revealed as he had instructed. Now would come the tricky part, if she did not accept, her life could be all but ended by a queen who had no need to aid the nefarious Dark One or accept his offer of payment.

The royal perched a thinly plucked brow? "Payment?" Rolling her eyes, she scoffed tritely as though insulted. "Does he think me some mace wielding mercenary to be bought off with promises of gold and riches?"

Casually, Regina flicked her gloved hand towards the beauty as though she were an irksome gnat. Dark magic erupted from her fingertips in streaks of bloody crimson.

In an instant the magic slammed into the beauty like a wildly charging horse gotten loose from the reigns. Cold, skeleton hands curled about Belle, squeezing her in an iron vice of newly forged fetters.

Pain wracked the beauty as the vile magic crackled through her and squeezed slowly to draw out her agony of strangulation. Invisible hands clamped tightly about her throat and curled tighter inch by agonizing inch as though reveling in her panic and torment.

Panic raced through the beauty as she struggled like a snake caught in the hands of a child. The alarm did not truly come from worry of her life, but for her failure to secure a way to hopefully see the Dark One saved. She would die at the hands of foul magic without saving her Rum.

"He promises you a special potion!" Belle choked out through the vice as the thought of failing her love speared a lance of icy dread through her belly. Her clever fingers pulled desperately at the sightless skeleton hands to allow her simply another breath to speak. "He…he promises you an elixir than will give you the revenge you've always sought!" Even as the words darted past her bluing lips she was swiftly succumbing to the darkness awaiting her. Blackness began to cloud her vision as her heart began to beat at an insipid patter. Barely conscious she whispered weakly . "He is willing to give you what you want the most; a way to utterly defeat your mortal enemy."

Surprise played upon Regina's features at the hasty words of the intruder. Her dainty hand flickered once more relieving the beauty of the bony hands seeking to throttle her into oblivion.

Falling to her knees, the beauty touched a hand at her bruised throat in abject relief. Coughs sputtered from her mouth as she realized how close to death she had strayed. A moment more and she would have been in the lands of twilight with her mother and wishing with all her spirit she could have seen her Rum one last time.

"A potion you say?" She stared down with interest at the shaken, gasping beauty nonchalantly. "Rumpelstiltskin rarely gives up a potion and when he does it is for no small fee. What sort of potion does he mean?"

Belle swallowed hard, her throat burning. Even now she could feel the marks the claw had left upon her skin like brands. "He…said it was a potion of rarest quality; a serum that can induce a death-like sleep upon a person but that they do not die. Instead, they are bound to a restless sleep in nightmares for all eternity, reliving their flaws and sins and drowned in pain from the life now denied them."

"Yes." Regina's hissed like a victorious viper having found a hapless prey. Embers of revenge smoldered in her jade depths at the thought of such a strong potion in her clutches. To think Snow White would be damned to an eternity of torment wrought by her own heart sent pleasure thrilling upon her nerves.

Rising unsteadily to her feet, Belle glanced at where the portal had deposited her in the veritable snakes den. Time was waning for her to be expected back. "Does that mean you will help?"

"Perhaps." The queen sobered into her normal composure yet again, though a trace of the fire did not abate from her eyes. "But there is so much you are not telling me."

Though the potion was a coaxing temptation there was no guarantee of what Rumpelstiltskin really wanted in exchange.

"I can't risk to." Belle rebuffed humbly, her eyes averted from meeting Regina's

A smirk donned her lips as she clucked reprovingly at the beauty. "And yet you risked your life to see me?" Her gloved hand, looking more akin to raven's talons, lifted Belle's chin upon her fingertips. "Why would you do this for him?" The queen murmured ponderously as she peered searchingly into Belle's azure eyes. Her gaze was akin to twin pools of green flame that coaxed the beauty to look upon her dancing irises.

"He is but an ally." Belle replied obediently, entranced by the dark flecks in Regina's pale, green eyes.

The harpy laughed sharply, her timbre low. "Oh but I can see it in your eyes there is much more to it than that. Even without magic, I can see an alliance with the imp is far from what truly is. You speak his name with affection; you plead for me to aid him as though you were fond of him." She sniffed slightly, her mouth creasing into a knowing grin. "You even smell of him. So tell me…" She curled a finger over a strand of the beauty's wayward hair. "How far does relationship delve with the Dark One? Is he a master or lover?"

"Will you aid or not?" The beauty forced her to speak those words instead of admitting what the queen already suspected. Rumpelstiltskin had not been lying when he claimed she was a dangerous one indeed!

Satisfied, at what she learned from the simply stare, the queen released her chin and turned upon her heel all in the same smooth motion. "I suppose I shall. The reward is great and I have no desire to see my kingdom under siege by an enslaved Dark One. I will send you back from wherever you came and proceed to your paltry kingdom as soon as possible to see for myself." Flourishing her hand she erected a swirling blue portal. "I suppose if you go back whole, he will know I agree to aid."

Belle nodded gratefully as she shuffled to the azure portal. Only when she reached the lip of the glassy exit did she notice she was quivered like a storm tossed leaf. She had made it through the serpents den of queen Regina and came out with a temporary ally if nothing else.

Though she was glad the witch had thrown he lot in with them, part of her could not help but think was it the right thing to do. How would she use such a potion upon and why and what would occur when she discovered Rumpelstiltskin had a way to be enslaved? Rum had assured her the potion would be used, but would not last long in the clutches of Regina. Still, she had to ponder its importance.

Banishing the troublesome thoughts from the forefront of her mind, Belle tiredly advanced into the tear through time and space.

The jolt of magic that powered the portals raced through her body like a lance of pain at all her nerves. Stumbling out the other end, the cold of the Dark One's lair seemed a warm welcome compared to the witch's tower where not an inkling of goodness dwelled within its stone confines.

Even as she pitched forward through the iris of the timeline tear, her love was there to steady her. His strong arms wrapped about her, holding her tightly to his chest as though she were some found treasure he had nearly lost.

Claws lightly rubbed her back in small circles as he buried his face into the crook of her neck elatedly. "You're alive." Relief choked his throat as he held her close to his hammering heart.

How he wished to proclaim to the world above that she was alive. How he wished for his lair to be filled with the sounds of his glee.

"Barely." Belle laughed blandly as she laid her head upon his heaving chest. "Regina will aid us, but I cannot help but wonder what else she is planning."

Petting her umber hair, the Dark One allowed a touch of ease to slip through his tense nerves. The moments she had been away felt akin to centuries crawling by at a snails pace. With each heart beat he had wondered was she dead or was Regina putting her under vile, ignoble torments to seek answers by the tearing of flesh. Until he held her once more in her arms he had not even been able to breathe properly.

Disentangling himself from her arms, the fiend held out a hand to lead her back to his bed of furs. Happiness glowed upon his gray-gold scales through the bickering torches flames. "You've done far more than enough. I can take care of Regina when the time comes."

"She's very cunning." Belle admitted troublingly, her brow bunched with worry.

What horror would occur if she unearthed the dagger and pried it from Gaston's clutches? What darkness would loom over the world then?

A displeased frown pulled upon Rumpelstiltskin's lips at the sight of her so wary. Offering a delicate kiss on her temple he whispered comfortingly in her ear. "Don't worry about Regina."

Regina was but a pawn in his grand game of life he had maneuvered for centuries. True, she was a powerful pawn, but a piece to be manipulated for his means nonetheless.

Abruptly a sly, eager grin inched upon his face. "Speaking of cunning, do you think perhaps we should play our part in not raising Gaston's suspicions?"

"What do you mean by that?" She perched and inquisitive brow as the Dark One pulled her down languorously upon the bed of furs.

The fiend gave his shoulders an indolent shrug as his Belle happily rested atop him, their legs becoming entangled. "He will grow suspicious if he finds us on less than ill terms."

The entire knight needed was one moment an alliance they had forged and both their lives would be forfeit.

"I see." Belle replied, her tone slightly mischievous as she lay atop the Dark One. "What will he think if he finds us crooning to one another like lovers, wrapped happily in each others arms?"

He would know he had made a perilous error. If he stomped down to the fetid dungeon and found them enwrapped happily with one another's arms he would surely know something was amiss. Rumpelstiltskin was to hate her, and she to be a defeated woman, beaten low my hard fists and cruel words.

Her bright smiled darkened with gray clouds of sadness. A sigh breathed heavily from her lips as she laid her head on his chest. "As much as I loathe it, we're going to have to make him think his judgment was right."

The Dark One's lips thinned with distaste. "Which means we shall have to make him think you were an innocent maid dishonored, and I was a Beast who had his way with his former mistress."

The whole situation left scalding, bitter bile upon his tongue. A monster he was but never would he think of defiling a woman so.

"It isn't all untrue." Belle remarked with a low coyness that suddenly perked his interest to a vast degree. "You did take my virtue."

He grunted a slight, flirtatious laugh. "If I recall, you _begged _for it, Dearie."

A sly smile carved upon Belle's lips as she eyed the fiend mischievously. "But Gaston doesn't have to know that."

"Indeed he doesn't." The Dark One crooned into her ear as she peppered his jaw with kisses. Closing his eyes in bliss, he allowed the moment of togetherness to bind them in their will.

Gaston would indeed see a woman without her virtue, but not know until he was on his knees and begging for life she had chosen the Dark One long before he had managed to take the dagger.

~8~8~

What had he been thinking! Gaston cursed himself vehemently with the darkest of vulgarities as he plodded like a surly bull down the incredibility bright corridors of his palace.

Torches, low with oil, seemed to glare brighter than the sun in his marred vision. Every step was a titanic crash of thunder that resounded about the stone. Smells of breakfast that wafted up from the scullery below set his stomach to pitch and heave worse than the roughest of seas in a summer gale

From the moment he had awakened with his mind murky and fogged, he had felt some instinct tug at his mind at a situation amiss. Only until he had seen the woman he had taken to bed, trying to creep away in the searing morn light had he recalled what thought troubled him so.

How had he let himself deliver Belle, the Beasts former mistress, into the creature's claws? Yes, he wished to see Belle hurt for rejecting his drunken advances, but he could have found some other way, not give them a chance to plot under the cover of darkness and away from his ears!

"The Beast wouldn't plot with her?" He rubbed his thick hand anxiously over the back of his clammy neck as he made the last turn to the doorway. "He hates her; he wants to see her hurt."

But then again, he worried, he could be so very, very wrong. Already they could have formulized a course to see him defeated.

Shaken beyond all comprehension, the knight all but kicked open the thick portal that barred the way to the Dark One's lair. Clutching the kris expertly in his clammy hand, he pushed the nausea of his hangover away as he trekked briskly down the slimy stone steps.

The dimness was a boon to his throbbing skull as he slowly paced his steps as though he were stalking a skittish deer. Light from the sparse torches glinted insipidly off the daggers magical steel as he delved deeper into the foul lair with the dagger poised at a ready.

He did not dare call the beast to him least he find a way to hide whatever they planned, if they truly had conspired against him. Each step was as silently as a shadow as he maneuvered through the fanged forest of rocky pinnacles.

He barely dared to breathe as he neared where the fiend slept. The dagger felt uncomfortably warm in his sweating hand, telling the knight, the Dark One was nearby, but that did not mean they had nothing awaiting him in the bleak blackness.

Finally, after what felt akin to ages, Gaston came upon the pair. His eyes measured the situation intently, leaving nothing out of his intrinsic search for malice against him.

The pair lay asleep upon the warm furs. The multi-hued pelts were mussed terribly as though some tussle had occurred all through the night, throwing them hither and thither. Dollops of faded blood spotted the stone and a few of the skins and even parts of the Dark One under his nails and flecking his hair.

Hatred and anger mingled with vile hints of satisfaction marred the beast's gray-gold visage. His talons were curled into tight fists as he slept fitfully.

Belle laid an arms length away from the monster that had captured her the entire night. Her body was miserably curled into a ball as she struggled to be as far away from the fiend as possible without leaveing the furs.

To Gaston it seemed she had tried to run, only for the Dark One to drag her back. Her milky skin was healed as though to keep her from death, but her dress was nearly ripped to shreds.

Her entire body rippled defeat and agony and humiliation that no woman should endure.

Gaston smiled with relief as he allowed his coiled muscles to ease. They had not succumbed to plots, he felt certain, by the looks of things; Belle would now probably hate him with the same fervency as the beast did she. To know this was to be her fate, seemed a sweet revenge to the knight she had rebuffed.

When other women heard her tale they would think twice of refusing him Gaston preened pleasantly. They would all know the fate of turning their eyes from him and finds another.

Sheathing the steel talisman, Gaston lightly nudged Belle's foot with his boot. Bulging arms crossed, he stared down maliciously as the beauty opened bleary red eyes that simpered with misery.

"You know better now than to deny me?" He glared down upon her with a cruel air of victory.

Belle merely nodded in reply, forcing the ruse to go on and make the ostentatious knight seem superior and right in every way. Part of her thought to add to the deception by begging to be away, but the thought tasted sour on her tongue. Never could she deny her love, her Rum in such a way, even at their direst.

Leering down at the still figure, his triumphant grin twisted into an ugly sneer. Rage flared like gouts of flames in his red rimmed eyes as he remarked insouciantly. "Pity it's to late. No man would want you know; you're tainted with…It."

Abruptly, the knight moved with a startling quickness. War scarred fingers clutched over Belle's arms covetously. With a slight grunt he hauled her upward.

The beauty staggered slightly as though she were weighed by some boulder upon her heart. Keeping her eyes down to the cold stone, she dared not spare a glance at her Rum or peer hatefully into the eyes of Gaston.

Never shifting from his prone 'sleep', the fiend grit his teeth to keep from leaping up and snarling at the brute of a knight to keep his hands off his love. To have Belle back in his clutches was a torture to his soul that only grew by the moment.

There would be no telling what the brute would do to her now that she was a woman bereft of her virtue. In ages past he had seen fathers who found their daughters with child, but without a father or husbands, enraged by infidelity, drag their mates out to the villages and proclaim their harlotry to all who greedily stopped to listen. Would Gaston ply his hand at something so utterly cruel?

"Where are you taking me?" Belle mumbled dourly as she plodded slightly behind Gaston. Her words reverberated off the conical pinnacles with enough strength to allow the Dark One to hear every word clearly.

A mirthless chuckle rumbled like thunder from his throat as he forged his way through the dark confines. "Back to your room, 'princess'." He mocked her now needless position with a sniveling voice. "There you will await the pleasure of the Dark One; the only one who would have you now."

"Better I threw myself from my window." She lied promptly. If she did not appear miserable he would assuredly grow suspicious.

Gaston tossed his head with obvious amusement towards her dread. Foolishness welled within him to think she and the monster would conspire. They now loathed one another and would be bound together for the rest of their lives.

As the pair resurfaced to the world of morn above, a bent servitor raced to meet them. An elderly man with a balding, sweating head bowed lowly to the knight, his gnarled hands clasped in front of him. His blue and gold livery was wrinkled as though he had only just managed to hop into his clothes and his dark eyes glittered with fear and worry and fatigue all at once.

His weary eyes flashed once to Belle, but shifted away in a hearts beat; unable to endure the beloved princess in such a foul state. All knew already what fate she had been succumbed in the night. The knight bragged about her punishment to wary guardsmen and the servants who walked by.

He had wanted them to know of her fate, a fate that could not have been worse to one of noble esteem and so loved by her people.

He had given their vaunted princess to a monster.

"My lord Gaston I was told to find you immediately." The aging man explained in a stuttering, humble voice.

The knight's cheery mood dissipated as smoke upon the wind. His jaw knotted with a violent surge of fury at the proclamation. No one requested him of anything any longer. "What fool gave you those orders?" He boomed ferociously down upon the glistering bald orb.

Belle flinched as his grip tightened angrily about her arm though he heart soared at the words that spelled hope for her Rum.

The servant's knees shook crazily as he cringed like a beaten dog. "My king, she came in a black, gilded chariot carrying the royal insignia engraved upon its side in gold. Queen Regina is waiting in the best parlor, seeking your attendance."


	22. By a Dagger's Point

_A/N: Thanks for reading and reviewing guys and gals. Note: Thanks to the reviewer who informed me on Regina's eye color. I didn't know it was brown :X. _

_**~8~8~**_

Something was certainly amiss, Regina noted with a hint of alarm in her tactile mind as she sat rigidly upon a plush, crimson divan.

The parlor in which she had been escorted to by frowning, worry eyed servants was a lavish affair that boasted a gross display of gaudy wealth. Silver and porcelian vases of considerable age lined every niche they could be set upon marble pedastals. Carpets of thick burgundy, woven in intricate scenes from far off lands clased with ivory inlayed tables and golden candelabras. Tapestries that looked older than time hung from the stone walls like festival banners no one had bothered to roll up.

The monarch twitched her nose unhappily in utter distate of the no doubt ornate, but ostentatious display, nay flaunting, of wealth. There was a tackiness that would make any noble with a fashion sense sniff with open disdain.

Gloved hands folded primly in her lap, the sorceress could not help but recall the wretched view from the outside of the once quiet, happy kingdom nestled by the snaking, glassy river. Things were not as they seemed in the small realm famed for its peace and serenity; that much was obvious to even the densest of persons who trod the territory of King Maurice.

Every face, young and old, was carved with stark lines of worry or drawn taunt with fear like a newly made drum. Children did not laugh and play and frolic in the cobblestone streets or by the stone fountains in the torrid heat, the verdant fields were quiet of the songs that rose from their laborers bending their hoes to their toil, and even the lazy, azure river seemed subdued as though under a malicious spell.

A dark cloud hovered over the entire land, denying its people peace or comfort. Safety was a luxury no one dared afford and compassion a poison that would kill in such black hours.

All about her the realm veritably reeked of Rumpelstiltskin's powerful magic. When concentrating upon a certain item she could even notice a faint wisp of pale purple mist where magic lingered upon his handiwork like a tendril of smoke from a brand in some morbid signature.

Either the Dark One was stringing her along in some foolish plot he had wrought, or something dire had indeed caused him to be captured. But what, she mused deeply, her eyes darkening with contemplation. Her spell clever fingers tapped her chin thoughtfully as she sat with a bored, demure grace. What manner of magic was strong enough to make the Dark One a slave and keep him one to where he was calling upon a woman who had a potential not to aid him at all?

Her thoughts were carefully tucked away like precious gems as the doors to the parlor suddenly slid open.

A plump, but haggard woman looking dour and drear with a bent back as though she carried some weight strung about her neck sighed tiredly. She was attired in a depressing gray dress and matching mop cap that lay snug over limp gold and silver curls. Her hands gripped an elaborately decorated silver tea tray burdened with a steaming kettle and cups.

Setting the tray down on an ivory, three legged table she offered a half curtsey. "The _king_ will arrive shortly." The maid announced morosely and turned to leave with the same languid pace she had entered.

"A moment, if you don't mind." Regina flicked her manicured hand thoughtlessly through the air towards the sliding doors. Instantly the twin doors shut firmly and clicked locked, denying the maid an exit.

A thin smirk etched slightly about the witches lips as she settled herself once more. "If you would be so kind as to give me information I could make it worth your while. I need to know only one inquiry that plagues my mind; what has happened here to this one bright little kingdom?"

Of course, the reward she alluded to would be no more than letting the pitiful woman live her miserable life and not telling the ruler the words that spilled from her mouth, but she needed not to know that yet until she had dropped every amount of information she knew.

Servants were the best sources of information, the cunning witch knew implicitly. The men and women who made it their jobs to remain unseen and quiet as field mice knew more of the kingdom affairs than their rulers! Ears of maids were always open and their tongues ready for a juicy slab of gossip to serve to another.

The hunched servant swiveled about vapidly. Her somber blue eyes were not filled with an inkling of fear, but the same sadness that overtook all other emotion. "What you see, milady is the product of one very foolish woman's wagging tongue. If you came seeking knowledge of the famed Dark One then it is true, Gaston controls the creature of myth."

Perching a plucked brow, the queen peered curiously at the plump figure. Curious eyes scanned the woman studiously as though trying to decipher rumor from truth as was always the case with servants who sought to spice up tales. Strangely enough, it did not seem the corpulent servant spoke an inkling of embellishment.

Hiding her suprise she pressed on with her inquiry easily. "Do you know how this came to be? How did such a powerful thing, the Dark One no less, become slave of this Gaston?"

"Before that horrid man ruled the Beast, there was another, whom the creature called master." The old maid explained lowly. "The woman who ruled the Dark One before Gaston managed to wrangle away the power for his own misdeeds was kind and generous and fair." The maid's large eyes grew sadder as though recalling a memory. "She treated the thing kindly and became a friend of sorts to it. She never used its powers for ill and never provoked fear into the heart of her people by threatening them with his power. And then, truly, the most foolish of women to ever walk the earth told that…that monster, Gaston a worry that had long tendered in her heart. That woman was me, and because of my idiocy, all you see around you is in peril."

Stinging tears streamed down her pale, dimpled cheeks though she seemed not to notice. Grief slashed her face into a mass of sorrow. "I am no longer able to see the girl I raised from a young sprite and I must carry the shame of knowing it was I who freely gave powerful information to the brute when she trusted me all because I could not look past scaled skin."

Because of her, her mistress was a prisoner in her own citadel and subjected to whatever wishes Gaston demanded. Rumor had reached her, though the kind servants had done a respectable job trying to keep it from her, that the knight had ordered Belle down to 'keep the monster company' as they referred to the atrocious, unfathomable act upon the beloved Belle.

One soul swore he had even seen them come up from the lair only a few hours before and that Belle's dress had nearly been torn from her slender form. Some said the beast claimed her for its own and that not even the worst of men would touch her now.

Untouched by the emotional tale, Regina sifted the details in what could be useful and what mattered little. And yet one thought troubled her mind. At length, she asked quietly. "Is this girl of who you speak have thick chestnut hair and eyes as blue as the sky and a mind sharper than a freshly forged battle axe?"

"You know of princess Belle." Sarah smiled sadly, thinking of the girl she had reared from a curious little tot. "Aye, that's her; Belle, a name for a true beauty inside and out."

Nodded sagaciously, Regina smiled slightly and relinquished her magical grip upon the door. "If that's all you know then - ."

"Prattling old woman, what are you still doing here!" Gaston roared suddenly as he entered. Nary a hint of decorum displayed upon his handsome visage as he stormed inside like a rabid bull. Behind him, the golden handles of the door seemed nearly ripped out of their sockets as though he had tried to pry them open with his bare hands. Eyes of blazing anger pinioned upon the dour maid like blades aimed for her head.

The saddened servitor merely grimaced in retort. Nonplused, as though she cared not a whit if the knight would kill her on the spot or reprove her, she shuffled away wearily. Spirit broken by her inadvertent treachery and his known betrayal, she flashed Gaston a look of utter hatred no other had ever seen in the kind eyes of the once ever cheerful maid.

Only one beast dwelt in the palace of King Maurice, Sarah knew now, and that beast looked all human.

There was not much to the mountainous male before her, Regina noted as her eyes searched his chiseled features. Dark circles told the tale of to many long nights swimming in strong wine. His flesh was sallow and waxy as though the wear of rule was already bearing down upon his back. Having power had made him paranoid, she could tell, for his eyes darted wildly as though expecting assassins to be prowling the shadows with their blades drawn and aimed for his back.

Glowering until the maid disappeared, Gaston instinctively slipped into his gentlemanly ways that had wooed many a woman. A charming smile traced upon his ale stained lips as he turned to face the queen. "My apologies you had to see that, your majesty." He bowed curtly.

"Always best to keep the rabble in check." Regina nodded politely towards the knight, a hint of a grin arced upon her ruby mouth. Her outside appearance displayed only clever calm and mild intrigue, but her vast mind had not halted thinking of what she saw strapped close to the knight.

A sheath belonging to a kris was stitched into his vest right in the center of his chest. A black, leather bound dagger handle stuck out from the top of the sheath like some talisman of luck.

Of course in her time trying to usurp the Dark One and become the most powerful sorceress in the land, she had heard only the faintest of rumors of an enchanted blade that could perhaps control the imp. Old, crumbling manuscripts wasting into fine dust and chronicles perhaps mentioned a spare word or two on the subject in the most ancient of arcane tomes, but usually no more than telling of rumors peasants created.

Could the blade steeped in the fogged shrouds of mystery and old wives tales actually exist? How had such a powerful talisman been found and how could she get her hands upon it if truly the kris strapped to the knight's large form could be the legendary weapon which granted Rumpelstiltskin magic?

Shifting slightly upon the divan, Regina forced her features to display not a hint of her shock or contemplations aimed towards the blade and its significance. Lips up turned into a wider ruby slice, the monarch produced a cream colored fan from the folds of her dress. "I find no sense to dawdle on pleasantries. I do believe you know why I am here." She snapped her fan open with a flick of the wrist causing Gaston to flinch as though she had struck him.

He was nervous, Regina grinned inwardly as she languorously pumped the fan to hide the devious curl of her lips. That was a good sign, she noted as a bead of sweat trickled down his temple, he was on edge of her presence.

Wariness choked the brute with a frigid claw that halted the breath in his lungs. Clearing his throat warily the knight smiled thinly. "No doubt you've heard of the power I have achieved." He seemed to puff out cockily like a strutting jackdaw trying in vain to seem bigger than he was. "The Dark One is my slave. He must do everything I command."

"Is he as really powerful as the legend claims?" The monarch queried, feigning a pointed interest in a creature only thought of as a myth though she knew better. The knight would never guess she knew well of the nefarious Dark One from a long time since if she did not offer the information freely. Many souls already believed him nothing but a phantom to scare unruly children or tales to be told on stormy nights; why should she act differently?

"The most powerful." Gaston boated proudly. "Which is why I propose a friendship, majesty."

Regina scoffed tritely, her lips twisted into a knowing smirk. Had she been in his position she would have offered the same, and he, no doubt, had other plans in mind. "A freindship that leads one of us to betray the other no doubt." Laughter, harsh and sharp escaped her mouth. "You don't think me so foolish do you? If you are like me when it comes to power and vengeance then your 'friendship' is naught but a betrayal waiting to become a blade tickled through my ribs. I would have a better try at honesty if I befriended a hungry lion."

Gaston unsheathed the polished blade as the witch rose gracefully from the crimson couch as though she were no more than a specter floating about the lavish chamber. The Dark One suggestion had seemed a good plan when his mind still throbbed and his heart beat as a racing roebuck fleeing from a hunter, Gaston realized, now he could see his folly in believing the words to see him safe. She would know it was a trap, not simply be cowed by his ownership of the Dark One.

"No." The witch glided gracefully towards the frozen knight. "There will not be an accord amongst us. Why should there be when the power can be mine?"

Thrusting her hand out suddenly, lines of power erupted from her palm. Power crackled angrily like tongues of crimson flames over the knight, but he remained unharmed. Magic sluiced over him in a wave of malicious fury only to break upon some invisible shell that encompassed him from ill.

Shaken, but more than alive, the brute managed a somewhat steady grin, his eyes flashing with triumph and brutish cunning. The magic he ordered the Dark One to endow upon him had certainly kept her force at bay. Now he needed no meager reason to barter with the witch and plot at a later time.

All but trembling the knight held out the blade, the tip pointed towards her heart. "You stay back. Dark One I command thee to come and defended your mast-"

Incredulity stamped upon Regina's pallid features as his decree echoed about the padded walls and delicate furniture. For a tense moment she seemed as though she would recoil from the blade and vanish from his sight, but only offered a cunning smile. Instead, with a flick of her wrist, the witch invoked a spell of silence upon the cocky brute.

Wispy tendrils of milky-like vapors sprang from the air as though beckoned from a world beyond. The fog became misty hands that sought to greedily clutch at anything that strayed within reach. Fingers conjured of fog twitched eagerly as they flew towards the knight at a ghastly pace.

Awed, Gaston could only watch in astonishment as the phantasmal hands disappeared down his mouth.

Words died upon Gaston's lips as nothing but dry heaves fell from his foul mouth as though he were trying to vomit with an empty stomach. Alarm danced fearfully in his red rimmed as at the sudden realization he could not call the Dark One to his side.

Cruel laughter erupted from Regina lips as she padded closer. "Poor fool." She tossed her head in mock pity. "You haven't the slightest clue of how magic can be altered or worked around. No doubt you have protection spells heaped upon you like plate armor, but there is always a way to circumvent magic. If you order the Dark One then I must simply take your voice away for a moment. No harm truly befalls you and the spell laced over you cannot rise to repel me."

Consternation danced in Gaston's eyes like roaring flames prodded by the panic that surged within. Disbanding the abjectly confusing notion of magic and all its foul trickery, he stabbed out desperately for the witch who had stolen his voice and could mayhap steal his life as well if he wasn't careful. Magic might fail him, but brute strength alone would not!

Calling magic again she insouciantly jerked the knife out of his grip as easily as a mother would confiscate a lurid rattle from a petulant child. Without his voice he could nary call for the fiend and without the vile imp he had no power to thwart her.

Puny attempts at physical combat were but pathetic drivel to the wrathful monarch's honed arcane skills that could melt the steel in soldiers scabbards, make arrow shafts catch aflame, or turn their own weaponry against them. Many who sought to claim her life with might, were most often the first to perish beneath her magic and the longest to beg for death from tortures.

Victorious, Regina hefted the light blade in her hand as though weighing the value of the legendary dagger that carried a burdensom load. The name of the Dark One lay inscribed in black upon the finely worked steel, telling truly to whom the kris belonged.

Already she could feel the wards of protection barricaded against the knight fall away like snow melting in a summer's heat. Piece by piece the lavender hued magic encircled about him drifted away like smoke upon the wind. Without the blade near his person he truly was no more than a large man with only fists.

With merely a malicious thought the cunning harpy sent the hulking man hurtling through the air.

A scream erupted from the cruel knights lips as he went careening through the summer air. His arms milled about crazily, trying to find something to grip as he screamed desperately for clemency and his guardsmen.

Neither of which came.

Breath burst from Gaston's mouth as his back collided to the stone wall with a thunderous crash. Invisible claws seemed to toss him about like a rag doll from tapestry bannered wall to tapestry bannered wall. His bones felt akin to wobbly jelly as his thick body endured the strain of pain. Torment gripped his hulking form till grateful darkness over took him with a terrible crash to his head.

A small satisfied smile edged Regina's lips as she carelessly let the now rather still knight drop to the carpeted floor. With a languid sigh, the witch paid the unconscious knight not another thought. He would have worse issues to deal with if he ever managed to awake again.

When peasant and noble alike realized he no longer had a monster under his thrall they would ascend in droves of terrible fury. Serfs and peasants would come with pitch forks and torches and ropes seeking to spill his blood in the earth he defiled and dance upon hi beaten body. Mercy would have been to spare him such torments from the grip of those who would slowly rend his body asunder.

"Now." She pondered aloud, her glassy eyes searching the blade eagerly. "How does one control my old friend?"

"You shouldn't try to pry secerts that should have remained hidden, Dearie." Rumpelstiltskin tittered almost jovially from behind.

Spinning on her heel, the queen glanced reproachfully at the calm Dark One. She had never been able to tolerate how he so effectively snuck up behind her like a master thief with nary a hint of his presence.

Her eyes flashed with wit and curiosity all mashed together in her glare as she forced her frown away. Giving him the satisfaction that he still managed to crawl under her skin could not be tolerated.

An infuriating smirk twitched impishly upon his thin gray lips. Legs crossed, he sat back lazily upon the armless couch as though the queen were no more than a servant meant to please him and she had done so with flying colors. Ease marbled upon his gray-gold scales sending a wave of hatred through her.

How she hated the thing before her, the cunning imp who managed to hoard vast power and yet the best he could do was meddle in the lives of mortals. He could have done anything he desired and yet he lived alone in a cold dark castle and _bartered _of all things, like a common merchant with a special ware!

"I have your dagger." Regina toyed with the blade curiously as though she'd never seen such a weapon. Her gloved index finger probed the tip cautiously as though measuring its lethality. Intrigue flared in her eyes, turning them into windows that displayed a deviousness behind her words.

He nodded curtly in assent, his face never shifting. "That you do, Dearie." Winking cheekily he held up a wiry digit and trilled in his falsetto. "But do you know how to use it?"

"If that moron over there can figure it out why can't I?" A hint of angry indignation flitted her timbre. She was by far brighter than the idiot caught trying to escape his fate without the blade.

"Do you really want to, majesty?" The fiend perched a brow inquisitively as he tented his fingertips and placed them under his chin. "On top of hunting down Snow White and ruining her life while managing a dissatisfied kingdom and any other scheme I haven't bothered to gander at, you want the burden of controlling the Dark One with the threat always looming in the shadows I may become free one day and then seek a terrible vengenace?"

Clutching the kris covetously in her raven like grip she stared steely eyes at the fiend. Keeping the dagger close to her chest, her glossy, vermilion lips curled into a snarl. "With this blade I can have anything I want at but a snap of my fingers."

"And there in lies the problem doesn't it, Majesty? You only truly want two things in life; happiness and revenge." Parried the ever smiling Dark One. "You don't need me and to be utterly truthful with yourself you don't want me. The only reason you would want me is to deliver Snow White into your grasp, but alas, even the dagger's magic has limits. You would not be happy to govern me. No, our partnership of sorts would be far more fruitful than my slavery would ever be. Don't work against me, Regina, I'm much too valuable for that."

He posed a convincing argument, the sorceress admitted inwardly, though it galled her very marrow to admit he always had a point. Everything that spat from his venomous mouth made her doubt and rethink, which she loathed with every ounce of hatred in her body.

The thought of doubly having to watch her back from the Dark One she knew was far more dangerous than her alliance and did not suit her in the least, and besides, she did not know all his secerts and to enslave him would make him most certainly not give any up if she did not ask specially. Some times allies were always better than hated slaves to call upon. Besides, if he could call upon her to take the blade, what stopped him from having other plans?

Her pondering eyes drifted down to the flashing steel embossed with his title that would command him at her whim. "You're right to some degree; I have no desire to enslave you and become paranoid like that fool. But you're mistaken if you think I want you rambling the realms wild and unchecked any longer. The kingdoms, no matter what our vast differences, are of one accord in wishing you would be stopped and your meddling would cease. What if I simply kill you? If the legends are true this is the only thing that will do it and make sure you stay cold and dead."

"You could." The fiend shrugged lightly, feigning a carelessness that was no more than a mask to hide a surge of panic that crashed upon the rocks of his heart. "But the consequences are far beyond your ken. Your entire world would turn upside down and you would lose the person you are" He warned lowly.

That, at least, was all very, horribly true. She would cease to be the woman she was, and become a woman changed into a thing of true ugliness that would make this Regina look akin to a saint.

For a brief instance, Regina stared absently at the kris. Her eyes truly did not seem to see the blade, but watch thoughts only visible to herself play by her eyes. "You know." The dagger lowered in her grip as she smiled slightly. "I think I'll take my chances."

Before another word could leave the Dark One's lips, the witch clutched the dagger in both her hands and raised the mystical blade high above her head.

She seemed akin to some primal priestess about to offer a pagan sacrifice to sate a foul idol. The steel came down with a murderous haste, its glinting tip aimed for the chest of the fiend.

Ebony eyes suddenly wild with fright, Rumpelstiltskin had only time to draw another breath before the dagger struck. A gasp blurted from his lips as the steel sliced easily through his gray-gold flesh and plunged deep into the muscle of his torso. The wavy razor edge of the kris hedged a rib as it sunk to the hilt of the long knife, nearly coming out the other end.

Blood flecked the vile monarchs pallid face with jewels of crimson as she stared down barbarically at the fiend. Her lips curved into a greedy, victorious smile as she pinned the Dark One down with the blade to make certain he would never shake it loose. "You have no idea how long I've wanted to murder you." She chuckled devilishly.

With him dead and gone, his magic depleted or given to her, there would only be one of great power; Regina, the most beautiful and powerful in all the realms. No gray-gold fiends who played the sides of Snow or Regina would torment her. Things would be different with him a cold husk, very different.

Black blood spurted from the wound and dribbled down his leather cuirass in thick oily drops. Torment screamed through his sinewy form as magic clashed within and his body shuddered from the unexpected blow.

Shock over came even the pain of the knife lodged in his chest. Out of all the things he thought Regina would do, enslaving him, letting him free, even gloating, he had never expected her to stab him. Was her thoughts of power and to be the best of everything truly driven her to slay him?

Belle had been right, he had underestimated her lust for revenge over her need to see him brought low. She wanted everything, he could see know, and wasn't particular in the order it came.

And now for his mistake he lay dying.

In his ancient mind he could see the smiling faces of his Belle and young Bae flashing through his vision. Laughter tumbled from their smiling lips and words he cherished in his hearts of hearts resurged in a wave of warmth to cull the ice that stiffened his limbs. There voices sounded close and real as he recalled times with them that would never leave his heart even in death with the beats stilled.

Belle the kind and Bae the brave, how undeserving was he to have known and loved such a pair. They were what he strove to be one day, and what he wished had governed his life instead of the chains of cowardice fettered about his neck.

How he wished he could have had them both together, living as a family, happy and safe and loved. How he wished to tell them both he loved them more than anything in the world and would never see them harmed for the rest of their days.

As blood flowed from the wound and marred his brown leather jerkin, the fiend could not help but feel something amiss in his wiry form. Pain flared through his body, but he was not dying, not in the sense of true death. The kris that had once belonged to Zoso did nothing to steal the last of his aged life or adhere the power to the wide eyed witch above him.

Forcing himself to focus through the agonizing pain he found the face of the hated witch who had tried to slay him. Fury smoldered in rising flames in his eyes, aimed for the royal who, like her mother, had been more than she appeared.

Shock, confusion, and alarm all danced upon Regina's pale features as she glanced at the bloody blade lodged in his still heaving chest. Hand slicked with gore she yanked the dagger from his chest in one mighty heavy.

A morbid fount of blood bubbled from his chest where the blade had been buried, but nothing more occurred. Even the blood that should have gushed like a flooded spring till not a single droplet remained in his body began to congeal as though the wound was knitting shut.

"That's not possible." Regina muttered aghast as she stared entranced by the kris. Numb hands dropped the dagger as though it were a poisonous serpent about to sink its fangs into her hand. "It shouldn't be possible!"

The blood streaked steel thudded upon the carpeted floor, finally out of the hands of mortals who could control the Dark One. For an instant the most powerful artifact in the world that could fulfill almost any dream lay at their feet.

Giving no thought to the blade now out of any hands, the witch stared amazingly at the steel. The opposite side of the dagger no one had given a thought to now lay face up like a stroke of fate had shifted the kris. Golden rays of sunlight made the blood gleam like rubies in the sweltering haze of day.

Upon the back side of the kris' blade was not written the moniker of the Dark One in dark branded letters. Showing through the twinkling smears of vibrant life essence the name flowingly carved in dark letters on the opposite flat of the blade read a far simpler moniker - Belle.


	23. Love and Darkness

"I might have known." Regina sneered wrathfully as she glared with a murderous zealously at the bleeding, yet still living, Dark One. The blade hadn't slain him or seized his powers; it had barely made him gasp as the kris rammed into his scaly flesh and bone.

A leer of abject fury twisted her glossy, vermilion lips into an ugly, beastly snarl. Unabashed hatred burned as an uncontrolled conflagration in her hard, brown eyes. Her smoldering stare spoke of the stoked embers that pulsed heatedly in her heart like coal in a blacksmiths forge.

"This was all another one of your games." She pointed a gloved finger at the imp accusingly. "That was it, just another trick to pursue some trinket you have set your eye upon! You did this to make a mockery of me!"

Her nostrils flared angrily as though billows of black smoke would belch from her nose like a surly dragon about to spit gouts of flames. Sensuous body heaving with blistering outrage, she flickered her spell worn hand through the air to bid magic to her call. "A fool I was to think your little lackey was telling the truth! Know this, Imp; I will not be so fooled again!"

With that, fetid, dark magic swirled upward from the plush floor as rising crimson mist that mirrored the red haze of anger billowing within the enraged sorceress. Sinuous tendrils of vapor coiled about her black garbed body like serpents coils to enshroud her in magic. Her eyes, the last part of her to vanish behind the folds of magic, seemed like mulled embers in the folds of fog as she disappeared back to her land to brood in cheated rage and curse the name of the Dark One.

Never would she fall for another trick of his again, she swore vehemently beneath her breath. A poisonous snake pretending to lay wounded in the grass had more honesty than the foul fiend!

Long minutes ticked by in the quiet red parlor with not but the faint sound of assiduous servants feet padding hurriedly down other long corridors and the trill of bird tittering their joyous songs to the summer day. Finally, when he was certain she was gone back to her palace of dark marble and misery, did the fiend dare allow a shaky breath to pass his blood stained lips. Air whispered tremulously past his mouth as though one hint of relief would have her standing back before him, her eyes aglow with some victory.

Death's cold, hollow eye sockets had stared him eagerly in the face and clawed with its bony fingers at his soul to claim for its realm of twilight, but still he lived by whatever miracle or stroke of fate deemed him to draw breath for another moment.

Amazed, Rumpelstiltskin placed a trembling hand upon his heaving chest. The flat of his palm rested on his leather jerkin as his thin fingers probed the tear in his gaudy attire in search for a gushing, slimy wound.

Pain throbbed only dully through his body in testament to where the dagger had struck true, and even that particular hint of discomfort was fast waning. The wound now felt to him as nothing more than a thick, upraised scar carved upon his body. Shocked, the Dark One managed to shift with only a twinge of sharp pain spearing his chest. Face wrenched in agony, the Dark One barley noticed the discomfort. His ancient mind whirled crazily at the meaning of his life still his own and not dragged unto death.

Regina had thrust the kris directly into his sunken chest the same way he had done all those long years ago in the dark forest to save his son. Zoso's wretched black blood had spilled freely from his veins to dampen the moist woodland floor with its oily taint, so why was his essence not sopping the carpets with gore and the witch not endowed with his power and curse?

Zoso, as all forbearers of the dark power, had perished but he had cheated the death due a thousand times over. There he remained whole and mostly unscathed from the fangs of death with but a scar to prove his peril. Why, or more importantly, how was he still indeed alive and granted magic?

A thousand thoughts dashed and clashed resoundingly across his mind as he looked down, hoping Regina had not taken his dagger in her furious departure. His eyes became widened in vast astonishment at the sight of the name etched in his stead. Belle's name lay inscribed with a malicious flourish script upon the blade.

For a moment he though himself in some delusion caused by pain, but how could that be when he felt little pain? How was Belle's name upon the steel? What had burned her name into the chain that bound him?

Scaled, blood smeared fingers quaked tremulously as he slowly reached down to touch the kris if to but see if it were real. Cold steel that felt akin to the hand of death itself met his wary touch.

It was his blade sure enough, he knew by the hum of power it emitted as he hefted the talisman of power. A glare of light from the streaming sunlight cast his gray-gold visage into a burnished crimson of flooding victory. Blade once more in his possession, the Dark One felt a sense of peace bereft in him for nearly a year course through his veins.

Curiously, the fiend turned the stained blade over to the opposite flat of the wavy weapon. His long name still sat engraved upon the steel as it had for centuries, telling that he was still fettered to the kris and whoever would claim the blade, if ever, again.

Brow furrowed ponderously, Rumpelstiltskin toyed with the weapon in his hand as though the answers would be whispered from the steel itself.

On a whim he placed a hand over his heart as though to locate a strange item. A name was still carved there, he knew instinctively without having need of a mirror. The name did not belong to Gaston or to Regina, but still the name branded upon his chest remained of his mistress and lover.

Why was her name branded upon his heart again as well as his dagger?

Of course after he had admitted the utter love for her in his heart the darkness in him tenaciously, wholeheartedly denied, he knew her to be his one and only true love. In the cool of the night, with the thoughts of perhaps never gazing upon one another again blazing like torches in their minds, they had coupled in the dank lair beneath the citadel.

He had taken her and not only professed his love, but showed it to her in the most intimate way a man could a woman. In the moment of sparked passion, whispering words of love into her ear and bestowing her with kisses every where save her lips, he had given her his heart, his all, his everything and she had returned his ardor with a fervency that superceded his own.

They had joined together in love and passion and every emotion ever bestowed upon man and woman.

Could that mean…?

A throaty groan abruptly broke the ponderous quiet of the ruby parlor severing the Dark One's journey of thought as a sword hewn through a single thread. In a dark corner, like a heap of pitiful human flesh discarded and shunned, the muscle bound Gaston shifted slightly in the throes of awakening agony.

His body slowly seemed to flop about with the fatigued will to rise like a fish beginning to die from lack of water. Muscles bunched in his mountainous body only to fall slack again with energy that eluded him like a coy lover. For moments the only thing that moved clearly was his breath gasping through his barrel-like chest.

Pain resounded in thunderous crescendos about the injured knights hulking form as he fitfully sought to fight for the tempting threads of consciousness dangling before him. Thick fingers grasped about the finery surrounding him slowly to search for any aid to help him. His mouth worked as to hail the guards but the words tumbled from betwixt broken teeth and a swollen jaw.

Placing the troublingly and confusion thoughts of the now double named dagger from the forefront of his cunning mind, the Dark One arose like a ravenous panther with its eyes stapled upon a floundering, wounded prey. Conjuring a sheath at his hip, he tucked away the dagger safely by his person.

The infuriating sight of Belle's ill and hurts raced back to his mind with a startling clarity keening through his brain. Every bruise was painted in his mind, ever mar and black and purple discoloration of milky flesh a lash upon his memory to remind him who had wrought such harm upon his mistress, his love, his Belle.

"Regina should have killed you, you know." Rumpelstiltskin commented dangerously, his tone bereft of all mocking joviality, as he flared his wiry claws through the air.

Clouds of dark purple magic engulfed Gaston in a shroud of crackling power. Intense workings of the arcane shivered through Gaston like bolts of lightening in a storm cloud. In an instant, as though a breeze had driven the clouds away, the knight lay again with all his ills healed.

Coughing and sputtering, the 'king' fumbled to rise to his feet. Energy surged within his muscled figure and blood pounded through his veins, giving him a spurt of his old confidence once more.

A venomous smile leeched upon his face as he tested his renewed strength. They would all pay, he vowed earnestly in his throbbing head now filled with the poison of vengeance. He would know better next time and see Regina, the witch, subdued and defeated accordingly for her insults!

Struggling to rise, he got to one knee, before the Dark One pounced. Scaled claws, like dragons talons, curled about the knight's oily, short cropped hair. A cry of pain tore from his lips, as the fiend hauled him to both knees so that he could not escape.

Anger that made the knight wish to shrivel into an unnoticed husk glared down at him with the fury of hell. How the Dark One's eyes blazed! His eyes were red charcoal embers that could sear skin and char bone. "You really should have begged her to kill you." He snarled lowly through barely pried apart lips.

"Why…" Gaston gasped desperately for breath as the Dark One wrenched his head back harder so that his throat was bared like it was waiting to be ripped out. "Why did you heal me?"

If he was no longer the Beasts master then why would he heal his ills?

A devious smile curved maliciously upon Rumpelstiltskin's mouth. Was the brute so dense after all as to not guess such an act? "Quite simple really; I don't want you to miss any of this pain to befall you. I want you in the best possible condition to feel every delicious pang of unfathomable agony upon your flesh whilst I skin you alive and feast upon your heart. I want you to have no undecided thought as to who hurt you, Regina or me. You will know every wound upon you came from me and me alone." His face neared the brute so that his scalding breath brushed against the petrified knight's face. " And when I weary of your shrieks, I will rip out your throat and drink your blood from your mutilated carcass."

Terror Gaston had never known in all his ignoble life sprang zealously through his body with a vibrant vigor. The knight's Adonis-like form, once solid as oak and adored by swooning women trembled without relent. Had he been standing, his knees would have knocked like some strange wooden instrument.

"Please." His hands clasped pleadingly and his glassy eyes were wide with horror as he looked upon the merciless, sable depths of the Dark One. "Please do not do this."

"You know." Rumpelstiltskin chuckled dangerously to the quivering knight huddled in a mass of terror. "I bet Belle thought the same thing as you beat her in your sodden fury. At least she had the courage and pride to bite he tongue and endure the blows to beg for a mercy that would not come from the likes of you. You hurt my mistress, my Belle, and now you must pay a hundred fold with blood and flesh."

Gaston gulped, his body now frozen with thoughts of his abhorrent fate laid before him by the creature that was quite capable of doing everything his promised. "No…no please just kill me, I'm sorry I-"

With a flick of the wrist, the Dark One silenced the whimpering cur. The silence would not last, the Dark One knew, for he still desired to hear the brute scream and revel in his pleas for clemency and a quick demise.

A mirthless laugh escaped the fiend's lips as his nails dug deeper into Gaston's scalp, bring a leak of blood. "Normally when I make some one pay I use magic." His fingers clawed deeper, brining a steady stream of crimson. "I turn them into snail or transform them into hideous creatures all man shuns and sometime I simply make their hearts explode in their chest. But you..." Shaking his head mockingly Rumpelstiltskin's free hand curled into a tight fist that shook with unchecked fury. "With you, I plan on doing things the old fashioned way…."

Looking upon vengeful beast that was the horrendous Dark One, Gaston had only a moment to open his mouth in one silent scream of terror before the devious fiend began to exact payment from the brute, bit by fleshy bit.

~8~8~

The blood red orb of evening sun was just beginning to fall into the bosom of the west as Belle spared a worrisome glace out the window of her chamber for the hundredth time. Ribbons of damson and rose and cream painted the setting sky in way to herald the rule of night. A few eager stars speckled the dulling evening firmament to take their place in the sky and delight the world with their ageless patterns.

In the time that had passed, Regina's carriage, gilded lavishly and made of black oak and gold, still sat in the courtyard like some rotting carcass or mauled carrion guards tried to avoid in their patrols. Only wary glances were given to the coach and even warier glares directed to the castle.

Hours had crawled by at a snails pace for the nervously awaiting beauty. With each languorous tick and chime of the clock she wondered if Gaston and Regina sat conspiring of her loves fate or that Rum was in the hands of a dangerous woman or even if he still remained in Gaston's cruel clutches and Regina no more than an unrecognizable mass of flesh and bone in a dung heap.

For hours she whispered encouragingly to herself things would go right, and for the most part she had remained hopeful until…_something _happened.

Noon had barely passed when pain, sharp and deep seemed to pierce her chest like a javelin had been thrust through her body and speared her heart. An agonizing gasp escaped her pink lips as she lurched forward. She had tried to grasp at her fluttering heart that beat crazily though she knew not why.

Clawing at her heaving bosom she sunk to the floor, her body writhing in torment and yearning for air that would not come. Screams nearly burst past her lips, but she was loath for a maid to see her in such a state and think the worse.

Tears of pain stung her lapis eyes and indeed she thought by some morbid twist of fate her time had come before she could see her love free, but as quickly as it came, the pain relented like a hand releasing it vice grip upon her heart. Relief soothed her heart and the pointed pain in her chest with a balm of certainty. The wound had been unbearable, but seemed to comfort her in a way she could not fathom.

Once gathered she fought the urge to yell for a maid and find out what was happening below in the ruby parlor between the sorceress and the knight. Had the pain been the last mortal agony her Rum had endured before dying? Was it a torment Gaston ordered him to enact or even Regina herself?

Hands clutched together, the beauty paced anxiously, her heart hammering uncontrollably. Night's satin cowl was almost upon the world and still not a single horse had been harnessed to the ornate coach which had now been moved to a corner of the courtyard below.

Grimacing dourly she looked beseechingly to the blue star in the twinkling heavens and spoke aloud to quell her nerves. "Be safe wherever you find yourself Rum. Please be alright."

"Worried are we?" A happy, tittering voice asked nonchalantly as though her fear amused him.

Belle turned upon her heel rapidly making her head whirl with a touch of dizziness. Her heart leapt like a frightened rabbit in her chest. Renewed air filled her lungs with the breath of life that thrilled through every nerve.

Leaning on a finely carved bedpost, the Dark One crossed his arms and stared happily at his love. He seemed unharmed and at ease, his lips joined into an impish grin.

Before her stood Rum, her Rum, with the dagger in his possession.

Scaled claws gripped the kris covetously as though it were a precious gem. Ebony eyes flashed victoriously in the last red rays of light. After months the dagger was back in his ownership. No power could dare thwart him now and no man his master.

A relived smile bloomed upon the beauty's features. "Rum!" Racing to the fiend she banished any thought of the enchanted blade and wrapped her arms about his neck.

So close to the woman who dared show him kindness even in his slavery, the Dark One could not help but have his breath catch in his chest. Her delicate scent of summer wove through his mind in the loveliest of perfumes and her arms felt of silk about his neck.

Would she forever spur such emotion to surge in him; to have her bring forth such wonder and happiness within his black heart, he inquired inwardly. Smiling, he found the thought not unpleasant in the least.

"Regina played her part perfectly." He shied to mention the stabbing lest his Belle grow worried anew and her lovely smile be lost to him. "Gaston has been…dealt with accordingly."

Perhaps, he considered for a tenuous moment after the deed lay done and the brutes twitching limbs were tossed in several places in the gory parlor, Belle would not like he had used such violence. Her face would have paled to know what horrid torments he had laced upon Gaston before he simply cried and begged for death. She would have wished him jailed and sent to plea before her father for his treachery, but his was a debt that only the Dark One would repay.

Certainly she would be upset to learn of all his ill deeds, but he would not apologize, nor regret what he had done. In fact he considered Gaston's demise a warning that would spread like wildfire through the realms and courts just as the gossip of his freedom made its circuit. No one hurt his Belle and came out whole in the end. If they truly wished to see his beastliness they would need to lay but one finger on her and they would wish their lives had never been brought into the world.

Disentangling herself from about his neck, Belle grabbed his shoulders and stared joyously at the Dark One. Abruptly, her elation faltered and crumbled into troubled melancholy. Worry flashed in her azure eyes as she recalled the words her love had spoken long days ago. Her eyes fell to the polished blade in his grasp. He had his dagger now which meant he would steal her away and destroy her people.

Peering intently into her depths, Rumpelstiltskin read what thoughts wrought such anxiousness as though she had uttered her fear aloud.

"Belle, you do not think I can allow so many people to know that I was enslaved or know about my dagger?" His hand tightened into a protective vice over the hilt, his mouth turning into a thin gray line. "They know too much and the tales will spread. If I could erase their memory of the blade I would, but the magic in the kris doesn't allow that or I would have erased every trace of the blade long ago."

Her sapphire eyes burned with desperate pleading. "They are my people Rum. They have done wrong and judged poorly of you, but they are my kin. I can't stand aside and let them perish."

"You are no longer my mistress nor I your slave." The Dark One retorted somewhat coldly. His lips down turned into a full frown. "If lives be lost then so be it. I need to make sure the blade stays as safe as possible; not only for myself, but for you as well."

Her delicate brow crinkled ponderously towards his words. "Me?" She echoed faintly in disbelief. What did the blade and his want to murder have to do with her? To be sure people might seek her out to learn of the dagger, but she would rather die by torture than deliver his precious secret to those that would seek him harm.

"Hold out your hand." He asked softly and extended his scaled digits.

Confused but agreeable, Belle warily thrust out her hand towards her love. Her palm lay upwards as though offering some invisible trinket to the devious imp.

Uttering a soft incantation under his breath, the Dark One summoned fire to his needles-like finger tips. Five pinpricks of red, bickering flame dotted his talons. Hints of gray smoke curled into the air, though Belle could not smell the burn of flesh or any noxious fumes.

The beauty's eyes widened as the fiend flicked his fingers as though trying to banish the crackling flames. Instead the fire dropped from his hand and leapt into her own as though the fire were a spry, living thing. Five small points of bickering flame melded into one gout of fire upon Belle's palm.

Instinct demanded, nay screamed, she shake her hand and extinguish the flame that would certainly devour her flesh and char her bones, but the hand remained intact with out nary a mar or wound. The five flames became a glossy red and orange orb in her hand that swirled with some contained magic. Heat pulsed against her face in testament it was no conjurers trick, and under her hand warmth touched her bones like a faraway flame, but nothing more.

"It seems my thought was correct. You have magic." Rumpelstiltskin remarked almost reverently, his eyes glimmering in the fire light.

The thought had crossed his mind when he saw her name penned upon the dagger. Now her involuntary control of flame confirmed the fear.

Forcefully veering her eyes away from the undulating mass of fire in her grip her gaze stole to the not as surprised as he should have been Dark One. "How…." She managed through her utter shock. How could such a power flow through her veins?

"Your guess is as good as mine." His eyes never left the guttering flame dancing in her palm. Flicking his fingers he banished the fire from her hand like snuffing out a candle as he continued "For as long as people have been named the Dark One and had their true names carved upon the steel they have always been loners. Every Dark One in existence has stood alone; in towers and hovels and castles locked deep away where the world would not have to languish upon their vileness. We have been solitary and shunned and then…" He found her eyes, his own shimmering with love. "Then you managed to break the loop and begin a new thread."

His fingers traced her cheek lovingly as a small smile twitched upon his lips. "Dark One's are not creatures to be loved. We are monsters and Beasts and yet you love me and I love you in return. By our love we are bound. I think, it was when we coupled the dagger knew it had lost part of me, but still it needs all of who I am. The kris cannot take back or dim this love, but there are always work arounds in magic, and since you have the rest of me…."

"It bound me to the dagger as well in order to keep all of you." Belle concluded with sudden realization.

The steel flashed in the last light sending the sharp refractions glinting about her face and his scaled visage. By their profession of love the dagger realized they were neither separate, but entwined in heart and soul. By their love they were one.

"Regina stabbed me with the kris." The Dark One admitted, serving Belle's thoughts of inherited power. Alarm flared through the beauty's azure eyes like a wildfire in dry straw. If the dagger could cause him pain then it could most certainly kill him.

Seeing her rising panic he added quickly. "But she did not succeed in slaying me. In order for me to die and my power be taken, you have to kill the person whose name is upon the dagger. But your name was on it as well." Closing the distance betwixt them he pressed the dagger into her palm. His hand on one side, her hand on the other, and their eyes remained locked. "Do you see, Belle?" He queried softly. Holding the dagger with her a warm smile grew upon his lips. "You see, now we are truly bound for we belong to one another and if I am bound to the kris so are you. Look over the flesh above your heart, and you will know."

Tremulously, Belle unlaced a few white ties of her dress with her free hand. Her breath stilled in her lungs as she peeled back only an inkling of the fabric for modestly. A flourished R and U peeped out from her gown telling that indeed his name lay engraved upon her just as her name was branded to his skin.

"Cant you see? This is why they must be destroyed." He gestured to the oblivious town sprawled below.

Night was nearly full upon the ever busy earth like a blanket to tell the world to rest for the sweltering day of morrow. Tiny flames, like stars fallen from heavens dotted the windows of homes and shop. Though they knew nothing of the exchange in power in the day, the air was palpable with a calm as though a threat had been lifted from their backs and they could breath at ease.

Taverns were once more bursting with thirsty, tired patrons, eager for gossip or bard tales and shy lovers were skirting the alleys to meet their loves and croon words of affection and forget about parents that would never approve.

All remained ignorant of the terror about to befall them from the hands of the Dark One they mocked and called monster.

Belle shook her head imploringly. "But this isn't right. You can't do this! The man I love wouldn't do this!"

The Dark One's eyes hardened slightly like black diamonds imbedded deep into his gray-gold visage. "The man you love would do this to protect himself and the woman who owns his heart. No one else deserves my mercy or affection, no one save you, my Belle. They would have been as cruel as Gaston and would have rejected you had you abdicated in favor to love a monster. I owe them nothing and neither do you. "

How could he forgive himself if another came across their blade and made them slaves. He alone was one thing, but never would he wish Belle to be cast into such a lot by some greedy little sot like Gaston forced to be a thrall to another without her free will and free spirit.

"Make a deal with me then." She laid her free hand atop his curled fist tremulously. "You have no wish to know another Dark One roams the realms unchecked. Spare my people and I will go wherever you wish me to go to remain an unknown. Take me to your castle and toss me into a dungeon if that would please you. Make me your slave if you wish it, but do not bring my people death. I will do anything you ask." She confirmed, her eyes glimmering passionately. "Please spare them."

Even at the thought she could nary bear to see the dead Rumpelstiltskin would leave in his wake simply to keep them both safe and covet the treasure that brought them power. Better she give up an entire eternity to a fate of captivity rather than see one of her people dead by his hand.

Truly then Belle was the most beautiful of soul and the gorgeous of face, Rumpelstiltskin knew imperatively. To give her life in favor of her peoples was an act many, princess or no, would not have done. Belle, if nothing else was faithful and loyal to the ones she loved.

And she loved him most of all.

"I will make you this deal." He engulfed her hand in his own, his grip firm but gentle. "I would never make you a slave Belle, but you must know how I want you. If you truly desire to save your people you will abstain from your rightful throne and come with me willingly to the Dark Castle. Since you are now bound with me and we both are bound to the dagger I will teach you how to control your magic and use the gifts you have. In the course of time I will reveal to you a plan that has long been woven and you must promise not to interfere no matter the outcome. Do this and I will spare your people a fate they deserve." He promised solemnly.

Curiosity clouded her worried features. Cocking her head slightly to the right she searched his fathomless midnight eyes. "For how long would my stay with you last?"

"Forever, Belle." He whispered tenderly in the darkness. "You would be by my side for as long as we both could draw breath." His fingers stroked her lovely face. "I would love you and never try to see you unhappy. I would ask you to share my bed and we would spend our days in the magic we control and our nights wrapped in the magic of one another's arms."

The deal he laid before her was more than just an opportunity to save her land, but a dream she had hoped for for long nights. A large smile stole upon her lips as she clutched the dagger over his own hand. "I agree then, on one condition."

"Anything my Belle." His murmured lowly, his voice husky and senses drunk upon her fragrance and sweet voice and loving touch. At the moment she but had to wish it and it would be hers with the snap of his talons.

"If I am to go with you forever then it shall be not as a some woman who struck a fortuitous bargain." Her eyes stared steadily into his fathomless orbs. "I will not be known as the Dark One's captive or merely his companion. I want all to know I am the Dark One's wife."

Smiling kindly to the brave woman that so wished to be part of his life, and truly was part of him just as he was a part of her, Rumpelstiltskin nodded slowly. If she hadn't owned his heart before she most certainly controlled every part of it now. "I would be honored above all men to be your mate Belle. What you see is a beast and a monster, but I will strive to be a worthy husband if you so wish to have me." His voice sounded meek and humble as though here were but a man again.

"I would be the luckiest of all women to have you for my husband." She replied gently, her smile like sunlight upon his skin. Crimson mounted her cheeks in a bright blush. "This is my deal, Rumpelstiltskin, if you'll have it."

Some much lay before them to be done, but to know that he would accept her as his mate seemed to bear over any other importance.

A genuine laugh rumbled from the Dark One's throat. Happiness surged within like a tide. There was much to do now that he was free, but for the moment the world could wait as he shared such a precious moment with his love.

Kissing her tenderly upon the temple he whispered softly into her ear. "The deal is struck then, my love, my Belle, my wife."

**~8~8~**

_A/N: Only one or two more chapters to go! While the end draws near don't think I would just leave it here. We have a few loose ends to tie up. Also, I would have put more violence to Gaston's demise, but then again, I didn't want this to go up to M for major violence and torture. Anyway, I think you all can use your imagination on what happened. _


	24. A Daughter's Confession

Oblique, golden rays of late morn cascaded grandly upon the slumbering realm of King Maurice in a glorious reawakening of life. A cool breeze sprang temptingly from the south of the lazy, snaking river as though to balm the heat the lidless orb would bear down upon the fields and people. The trees verdant plumes were gilded with cooled dew and gold in a grand display summer's apex. Birds chirped gaily in their perches as the world awoke to a wondrous day from under the yoke of the cruel Gaston.

A beam of tawny sunlight through shifting azure curtains coaxed Rumpelstiltskin from the realms of wondrous sleep. Light seemed to penetrate past his shut eyes to announce the day he spent wasting in bed.

Groggy, he prodded himself from the land of slumber into full wakefulness as Belle shifted slightly in his arms. Her pale, creamy flesh, so soft and supple against his rough, scaled skin lured him out of the realm of dreams and into a moment of abject bliss.

Opening his eyes, despite the sear of sun boring into his onyx depths, he gazed upon a gorgeous sight that he wished would forever greet him in the morn so long as he drew breath.

Belle lay nestled comfortably against his wiry form. Her body curved into his frame perfectly as though being near made them complete. Her wild russet mane was mussed with sleep and draped over her slender bare arm. Golden sun danced in her hair making her glow with the effervescence of light and life. A small smile played upon her lovely face as though she were in the throes of a wondrous dream.

What had he done to deserve such beauty to lay happily and freely in his arms, the Dark One pondered in awe? What kind turn of fate deemed him to share a heart with one so lovely and good?

Delicately, the Dark One lifted a scaled hand to her cheek. His wiry talons barely brushed against her flesh in a reverent touch. Her silky hair slipped through his fingers as he basked in her beauty while she slept.

Oh but she was beauty incarnate.

"That tickles." The beauty giggled sleepily as her eyes fluttered open. A lazy grin stole upon her features as she snuggled closer to him for warmth under the nest of silver, silken coverlets.

Furling his hand away as though caught touching some sacred object he eyes glimmered with unsuppressed love. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you." He replied gently, his voice low and caring.

"It's alright. I'm normally up far earlier than this." The beauty assured tenderly as she rolled over to face her love. Sighing contentedly she smiled at her Rum with all the love that could be found in her heart.

For a moment the pair simply stared at one another and breathed in the intoxicating, alluring scents of summer and of each other. Would every morning begin so wondrously?

Belle's clever fingers roved curiously across his chest as though searching his body with but her fingertips in lieu of her eyes. Honeyed light from the windows granted his oddly hued skin to glimmer like bits of gold in a rivers bed and his eyes to shine like polished obsidian.

Lying in bed with her love would always triumph over arising before the sun. To languish away half a day under a sea of silken sheets and thin coverlet and goose down pillows seemed a paradise once only confined to the depths of her heart where she dared only dream and fantasize to be in his arms.

A large mischievous smile drew upon the fiend's visage. Laughter rumbled like a mischievous growl in his throat as he kissed her forehead. "Well, we did have quite a long night."

"And many more to come." Parried Belle, catching on though his impish mischief. "It begs me to wonder since you are to be my teacher and husband which shall you be first; my master or lover?"

"That depends." His arms wrapped about her firmly as his nuzzled and kissed her neck. "Which will you be first; my apprentice or my wife?"

Late in the dark hour before rambling on to more pleasant ventures, the fiend had duly warned her of the perilous road she would tread as a wielder of his magic. His path was neither of good magic nor of the magic that wobbled precariously in the center of good and ill. His power was the purest of blackness and the most potent of the dark arts.

All magic, and especially his own, had a horrid, brutal side, and while he would do everything in his power to refrain from the most devious and gory of incantations and spells she still had to learn them if her skill was to be on par with his own. She would bring a light to his dark craft, he knew on instinct in what little comfort than gave, for Belle was a ray of goodness that pierced even the blackest of hearts and souls.

There would be things she would loathe to do, and there would be particular rituals that would make her gut squirm and knot with unease and disgust. Their road would not be an easy one; he having to adopt part of her light and her part of his darkness. Despite the mountains they would have to climb and perils to face, she still vied to love him and call him husband and he chose to love her with all his soul fend away the darkness as best he could and proudly claim her his wife.

Soft peals of merriment tumbled from her lips as she kissed his heaving chest. "Wife most certainly. I plan on brining out the Rumpelstiltskin I see deep inside."

Abruptly her gentle laughter tapered away as though a blot of black worry tinged her bright mirth. Sadness slashed upon her features like gray storm clouds in a fine day. Placing her forehead upon his chest, a sigh sprang plaintively from her lips. "Things would be far easier if everyone saw the man I see."

The mention of magic and her bargain to learn the dark arts rekindled the thoughts of having the town she had saved learn of her departure with the fiend. Her father would be less than pleased and Sarah…Sarah would perhaps not even think her serious till the Dark One was ready to ferry them away.

So much had to be done in the course of one day. Lives had to be altered and fate reformed and a bond to solidify betwixt them. Though she was leaving she still desired to be married in her home.

Melancholy dashed her face, sending a pang of regret through the Dark One. How he loathed seeing her dour and disheartened with a situation she would bear the brunt of alone. The people would sneer and call him Beast, but they would curse her and roar in anger at their princess who should have carried their sacred traditions instead of fleeing with a monster.

"We don't have to do this. Say the world, my Belle and we will be gone with a snap of my fingers." He revealed with a kind aplomb to his Belle.

She tossed her thatch of chestnut hair. "I will not run. What will be will be; though…" Her lush mouth twisted with a dark frown of displease with thoughts of what was to come. "I do wish it was easier."

~8~8~

"That's it." Rumpelstiltskin nodded succinctly, his voice somber and thoughtful. Fathomless onyx eyes stared ponderously out into the distance beyond the gray walls and homes towards the horizon and beyond. "All of Gaston's works have been undone in the time it took them to finally haul themselves out of her bed and dress themselves. Homes have been rebuilt, fields planted anew and even wound repaired."

Belle smiled wanly and yet proud towards her husband to be. "Thank you. I know the other realms will be grateful and my own people happy to be from under the iron heel of that tyrant."

Even though her Rum made no mention of the fate that befell Gaston, she was certain it had been a horrid end, but one he probably deserved thrice over. The cruel claws that had curled over the land were slowly being pried away one by one until she could tell her people Gaston was no longer in power and that things had been set aright. That however was saved for last when she announced her abdication of the throne to her father and her refusal to rule. Her true trial would begin with two people she held close to her heart.

The Dark One coughed awkwardly into his fist. "Well, if you're satisfied I'll head down to the dungeons and prepare to send all my things back to the Dark Castle.

Of course, the shift would take but a snap of his wiry talons, but Belle wanted to face the only others she loved alone. An inkling of him could not help but feel hurt but he certainly understood her reasoning. With him lingering by like deaths cold shadow they would think he forced her into some atrocious marriage for revenge or warped her mind into thinking she had fallen in love with a monster. At the thought a grim frown pulled upon his thin gray lips. Given whom he was and the reputation of creature and demon spawn, he could not really blame them if they wandered to such a conclusion. Even though he knew she loved him with all her heart, he was struck with the same vast astonishment he first possessed at times that she loved him.

"Thank you for understanding." She gently laid a dainty hand upon his shoulder comfortingly. A sad smile curved her mouth as she extended her hand to his warm cheek.

Love for him welled in her heart that became an unstoppable flood. The fact her people would not be pleased mattered not, nor did the knowledge she would have to face the scrutiny destined to be lashed upon her. Her love for him was all that mattered and the will to see his goodness resurge once more her only quest.

Taking both her hands in his, the Dark One kissed them solemnly as though they were some magical treasure. "I'm only but a word away should you have any need of me, my Belle."

With that he departed in a spurt of lavender mist leaving Belle alone to face her family and friend. A sigh tumbled from Belle's lush pink mouth as she turned to the door. Sarah would be first, she decided, for she of the two would perhaps be reasoned with to a greater extent than her unmoving, traditional father.

Treading out from her bed room warily, the beauty scanned the sitting room that connected to her innermost chamber. Her head swiveled precariously as though expecting some foul lurking beast to leap out from behind a painted screen or blue couch.

Before Gaston had been transformed into a cruel despot and power hungry tyrant the palace of King Maurice had been constantly abuzz and bustling with activity like a large ant hill in summer. Servants and nobles trekked the ornate corridors and languished in the well kept chambers that were humble but fashionable. Never was a room left unoccupied for more than a day.

Her rooms alone had a constant stream of light hearted maidens with a penchant for gossip and romance and good hearts. Their merry laughter and talks of visiting nobility or lords from their country manors oft filled the room like the caws of crows and jackdaws, and yet there was a normalcy to the noise. Now the chambers lay still and bereft of servitors.

Occasionally a servant would leave a plate of food at her door and scurry off, but even that had ceased when Gaston took to one of his fine rages.

Determination filled the beauty with a stoic power that rushed through her veins like the magic she was now endowed. Tall and confident, Belle exuded bravery as she traipsed down the empty halls to seek her guardian's room.

As Belle's guardian Sarah's room was nothing akin to other servant's quarters down below near the kitchens. She boasted a quaint room all her own in the east wing where the hustle and bustle of the keep had always been quietest.

"Milady?" A voice suddenly piped up from behind warily.

Startled, Belle jerked about, her tongue ready with her love's name should someone with ill intentions strike out at her.

A young servant woman in a white cotton dress peeped her head out from a door in the long corridor. Her glossy, black hair was bound in a loose bun and her jade eyes sparkled with a tenuous mix of relief and fear.

She licked her lips as she gazed in both directions down the silent abandoned hall once more to make certain Belle was the only soul in the corridor. "I though you was that brave Ambrose, the young serving lad come back with news or some food he could scavenge. A right few of us have been hiding in the east wing since Gaston claimed himself king. We feel like rats in a nest just daring to scuttle out for food and necessities in the dead of night or when we think no one would be looking."

Her doe-like face mellowed with simple curiosity. Her vice grip upon the door lessened as she took a step out from behind the portal. "Last I heard you were captured and forced you your quarters. How did you manage to escape?"

"Gaston is no longer king. His rule is ended and he lays dead." Revealed Belle simply.

Utter disbelief painted the servant woman's wane features. For Gaston to be usurped seemed the glorious of all news to be had in the kingdom since the defeat of the marauding ogres.

Motioning to the servant girl, the beauty coaxed the wary woman out like a frightened, hungry animal caught under a cottage. "There is no longer a reason to hide." She assured the humble maiden. "The Dark One is no longer under his thrall and the ills he demanded have been mended. Take the news to everyone you can find. Send a runner to tell the townsmen and see if he can find a horse to take to the villages."

"At once, milady." The elated servitor dipped a deep, respectful curtsy. Life seemed to rise in her cheek like the glow of morn upon the dark world. Gaston's end was akin to the last hard snows of winter before the spring could commence.

"A moment more." Belle placed a hand upon the maid's arms as she began to depart for her quest. "Have you any knowledge of Sarah? Has she been confined to her rooms or is she hiding with the lot of you?"

Sadness welled in the green eyes of the maid at the mention of the beloved guardian. Her eyes darted away from Belle's kind azure orbs as though afraid a truth might be found in them the princess would loathe to hear.

Plucking at her thin sleeve nervously she shrugged. "It's a rather delicate situation milady." She dodged expertly, her voice suspiciously low and almost comforting.

Blood pounded through Belle's ears like war drums rolling on the field of battle. Icy dread chilled the sudden pit in her stomach with thoughts of alarm that prowled her brain.

"What of Sarah." Belle demanded to know, her voice creaking with concern for the kind woman who had raised her. She and Sarah never truly saw eye to eye with life, but she had been a mother and a friend and she was loathe to learn of any horrid fate to befall her.

"We don't really know what's wrong with her, but Stella, the oldest of us, says she has a broke heart milady. It's not good." The servant testified sadly. "I aint a healer or the like, but even I can see her life is waning into the realm of infinite shadow."

It couldn't be, Belle wished as the maid offered a consolatory word under her breath and departed with the cheerful news to her fellows. Servants in rumpled blue and gold livery or clothes detailing their stations spilled from the large room like water from a broken dam. Joy burst from their lips and a ray of happiness broke the darkness over their taunt faces, but Belle hardly gave notice.

Her dull steps thudded without sound to her ears as she lumbered down the now eternally long corridor before her. Peals of laughter and cried of delight sounded dim and insipid indeed. How could Sarah be ill. Sarah, the hardiest, healthiest woman in the entire kingdom had never given a day to sickness. Had Gaston played a hand in weakening her if to but make Belle miserable or had age finally met her on her long and vigorous road?

For what seemed like an eternity she padded through the traipsed hall with its gaudy grander and lavish wealth until the beauty all too abruptly found herself in front of the heavy oaken door.

Nothing was unusually of the thick portal, and yet memories resurge through Belle like the rising tide. Years had crawled by since she had last been to Sarah's room. As a child she had far preferred the simplicity of the chamber compared to the lavishness her father demanded be draped upon her. Life lessons were taught beyond the gate before her. Sarah had held her and let her cry until the front of her dress was soaked with tears when her mother had passed.

Curling her shaking hand over the bronze latch she entered with nary a sound. Though the sun beamed gloriously upon the world, the windows were shuttered and the room lay in semi darkness as though twilight had truly fallen.

Though dimness swathed the room like a shroud, Belle had no qualms making out the figure in the small quilted bed under a high latticed window. Her footsteps made nary a sound as she glided along the cold stone towards the plump figure nestled in its bed. Despite her will to remain strong and firm she could not contain a gasp at the sight of the matronly woman.

Sarah's hair seemed more of ashen gray than the honeyed curls tat usually flounced with each happy step. A pallid, cyanotic hue dabbed her rounded face as though the life were being vapidly leeched from her body by an unknown parasite. Her face seemed pinched and oddly wizened and deep crow's feet etched the side of her eyes as though blades had scored them upon her once merry visage.

She looked old, older than Belle had ever seen her. A grim haggardness exuded from her and a weariness that told of suffering unleashed like poison in her veins. If she was suffering from any ill then it was certainly due to a broken heart.

"Sarah." Belle murmured heart wrenchingly as she fell to her knees by the edge of the bed. Her hand delicately touched the chaperones pale brow to find her cool and her flesh clammy.

Her words, like a ray of light in the turgid darkness seemed to lure the servant awake.

Blue eyes pried opened slightly as though she were afraid to see some one who only sounded like her charge. For days she wallowed in horrid terrors concerning her darling Belle and the ills she had wrought and now she could scarcely bear another mirage of her ward who would undoubtedly be angry and rave and curse her without relent.

A wane smile fell upon her pale lips as she sighed contentedly. This Belle looked concerned, not injured or furious with what she had done. "Is this finally a good dream?" She croaked through her dried throat.

"It's no dream, Sarah." Belle clutched there guardians hand tightly with both of her own. Her hand felt so cold compared to the beauty's. "I'm here, I'm real. Gaston has been vanquished and I am free."

At the mention of the knight, the maids smile crumpled away into nothingness. Tears of abject regret brimmed her dull, glassy eyes. "Belle…" Her voice faltered for a moment as though her bravery deserted her. Steeling herself she inhaled deeply and pressed forth. "Belle, I was the one who told Gaston of the dagger." She admitted hollowly, her words chocked like a boulder in her throat. "I was so afraid you were being used by Rumpelstiltskin and throwing away your future that I told him my fear of you being under an enchantment. Everything you've endured is my fault."

Hot, regretful tears streamed down her pallid cheeks. "I'm so sorry child, I never meant for anything to happen this way. I just wanted you to be happy, to have something I couldn't."

Staring upon her withering guardian she should have been upset at the revelation, the beauty knew imperatively. Anger should have brought heat to her blood and rage simmering in her eyes, and yet she felt only the coolness of grief and the balm of forgiveness pressed her soul.

"You are not only to blame, Sarah." Belle sniffed, holding back tears. "Had I not been so cowardly, to teeter between a delicate line I knew was perilous for so long, perhaps none of this would have happened. But I was caught betwixt love and duty, and I was so frightened to choose."

The noble Sarah shook her grayed head somberly. "Do not cast blame on anyone save me. It was my own past that blinded me to see that you did not truly love that monster."

Looking away as though her eyes became windows to the past, the maid stared upon the gray ceiling as she spoke weakly. "Long before you were born there was a man named Marcus. He was mighty as and ferocious the most powerful of wolves and there was no peer to his handsomeness." Laughter strangled from her throat before fading away. "I loved him very much as most women in my time did. He could have had any woman in the kingdom yet he loved me. But you see, he was a noble and I a mere servant. We loved one another with a passion that could not be quelled. Though we knew it to be wrong we planned on marrying and running away."

"Everything was planned, but at the last moment he decided against tossing away his station and breaking the rules of our kingdom. Duty was the chain about his neck that kept him from crossing the border with me and finding a new life. Tradition had to be followed, the cycle could not be broken. His people one out over me and he married some pretty noble woman. She bared one son before she died. He was a strapping boy that looked so much like his father when he grew up you would be hard pressed to find any difference in their appearance. His name was Gaston."

Her plump, shaking hand fell over Belle's own. "I wanted you to have the life I couldn't. I knew it was wrong and selfish, but I wanted to live vicariously through you. I wanted you to have the life I never could; to be happy and not have to decide between duty and love. I foolishly looked past his faults seeing only the outside when on the inside he was nothing like his father. I should have seen that you didn't love him, but I was so wrapped up in myself to look closer. In the days to dwell on my folly I've had a long time to think back. I saw on the first day when he arrived who truly had your heart, my soul simply refused to admit it."

Patting Belle's hand she managed another smile. "Call him child. I have something I must say to the both of you."

Shocked and intrigued that the woman who oft professed her dislike for the Dark One wanted him so near, the beauty uttered his strange, name that always tasted of warm, summer honey upon her tongue.

Magic crackled about the room in an instant as the last syllable left her mouth. The tingling of raw power crawled upon Belle's skin pleasantly as her love materialized in a lilac hued mist. Rumpelstiltskin knew how to make a grand entrance when it pleased him.

A dark grimace mingled with concern for his Belle marred his gray-gold visage as he stepped forward strongly. Staring down at the bed, he fought not to sneer for Belle's sake at the crumpled woman peering up at him. The woman laying before him had always disliked him so why should he show any pity for what ill she had?

Sitting up with Belle's aid, the servant stared at them both with almost a regal air. Her watery eyes seemed to look inside them with an equal gravity and intensity as though measuring their ardor for the other on some invisible scale.

At length she turned her head to the Dark One. Displeasure sparked in her eyes as she frowned towards the Beast. "You love her?"

"Yes." The fiend replied curtly, his tones clipped with an edge ice.

Her head swiveled to the beauty. "And you love this uncouth, disagreeable creature better suited to the wild forest than a palace?" Amusement traced her wavering timbre.

"Will all my heart." Belle smiled holding back a low giggle.

Nodding sagaciously, Sarah cleared her through primly as she always did and smoothed the wrinkled blanket laid over her. "I've always considered you like a daughter Belle. I know I could never replace your mother, but I have come to think of being a mother to you. I think I speak on your mother's behalf and my own when I give you both my blessing. I wish you both happiness and pray it never wanes."

"Thank you, Sarah." Belle leaned in and kissed the elderly matrons forehead tenderly.

Surprisingly, instead of the cool, deathly touch that turned Sarah's parlor a grisly shade of white, the beauty felt heat within the maid servant. Ember of life and fire seemed to be building in her once more, banishing her ills and knitting the wounds inside.

Turning her head to the Dark One, her eyes glimmered with clandestine gratefulness and knowing. Whatever had been ailing her beloved guardian was now on the mend; another gift from her husband to be.

The loyal servant did not reply to her thanks for her eyes closed almost instantly in a healing sleep. A gentle peace delicately smoothed over her still lovely features. She seemed in a tranquil repose, and Belle could but guess she was dreaming of her beloved Marcus.

She would awaken feeling as her old self and as spry as she had been before the treachery Gaston had dealt the ferocious blows of abject tyranny upon them all, Belle knew instinctively. Rising from the edge of the bed, she stared down lovingly at the woman who had raised her.

"Good bye, Sarah." She uttered lowly and smiled warmly down to her guardian.

A sigh fell from her lips as she and her mate exited the room. The hall was empty though footstep echoed from adjoining corridors and the low hum of voices rose like the words of invincible phantoms about them.

Steeling herself, the beauty smiled gravely as she leaned against the closed door. "And now for Papa."

Nodding, the Dark One began to beckon magic to his command to leave her to her last hard task. This hurdle, they both knew, would be the greatest to scale and perhaps the most treacherous.

"No." Belle rested her hand upon his magic tinged claws. Sorrow marbled her face as she shook her head plaintively. "I should have asked you to come along. I shouldn't have thought to do this alone. You will be my husband and I will not try to keep you in shadow no matter what father may assume."

"You think he will take this news poorly?" Rumpelstiltskin queried curiously. With but a thought he changed the flow of magic to take them both to the quarters of the merchant king Maurice.

Melancholy flitted Belle's lovely features as they became smoke upon the castle's warm currents. "I pray he shall be as understanding as my dear Sarah, but I am not inclined to believe him changing."

~8~8~

Hoarse breath rattled fitfully in the corpulent form of King Maurice. Under thick, ornate winters blankets heaped over his obese figure the monarch shivered with cold not even the summer's sun could relieve.

A small table next to his excessively large bed sat filled with tinctures and salves for his chest and colorful amphora's filled with disgusting pale potions concocted by apothecary's and women who knew of forest lore and the plants that helped ills of all kind.

Sweat streamed copiously from his flabby, rounded face until his pillow lay sopped and the front of his silken night shirt was drenched in wet, but still he shivered in a delirious, swivet state. Dreams raced through his mind in blinding whirls and hard voices of the dead and living scolded and mocked and cried out to him.

In the dense fog of abhorrent nightmare he made out the hulking figure of Gaston. Basalt horns curved upon his head and his teeth were wolf's fangs that dripped with blood. His bear paw hands clawed at his daughter and a dagger she held in a death grip.

"_Give it to me, Belle." _The man-beast Gaston snarled and slashed a paw at her. The mark struck true and Maurice could only give a soundless cry as she tumbled to the floor face down. A glossy pool of blood seeped under her as though dead.

He tried to run to her, but the brute hauled her up by her matted umber mane. Tendons in his neck popped out like steel cords as he leered lasciviously at her slender figure. His hungry eyes gazed at her with wantonness and want.

Before he could paw at the helpless Belle, he scoffed cruelly and tossed her away into a dark bottomless pit. The world about him seemed to twist and shift to a red and black darkness as he raced to the pit. Dropping to his knees he stared down with a hand out as though she could reach.

As he watched his daughter fall forever into eternal blackness, the pit closed then reopened as though blinking. Looked down at his surrounding the monarch found he was not looking at a pit but an eye of the Dark One.

"No." Maurice struggled ferociously beneath the covers, trapped in his nightmares of his own waning mind. "No, no, Belle. Run away from it…run."

"Papa." Belle sat on the very precipice of his bed. Her hand found his as she attempted to wake him from his terror. "I'm here, Papa, I'm here."

Hands behind his back and keeping a respectful distance, Rumpelstiltskin frowned ponderously. "I fear the strain of losing his kingdom has been very taxing. His health has vastly deteriorated. Gaston had him confined to these rooms though I doubt it would have made a difference. He can barely walk, much less have tried to escape."

"Help him, please." Pain danced behind her cerulean eyes to see her beloved father lost in such a horrid state. How terrible to be trapped in a nightmare without the mercy of waking?

"You will aid him." The Dark One neared and loomed over the aged king like a studious physician. "Consider this your first lesson in magic. A minor healing spell will mend whatever causes this coma of nightmares and pull him out." Taking one of her hands, he held it out towards her fathers sweating head. "Focus on his mind and try to feel his pain. Grab the magic inside and make it do what you want. Make it heal what you feel. Demand it take the pain."

Determination steeled in her icy blue eyes as she focused on the magic that lurked in her soul. The power in her felt akin to a slick glassy orb of crimson nestled like a pearl in the folds of her spirit. Calling upon the latent power she felt the magic flare through her veins. Arcane power galloped widely through her blood like a torrent of uncontrollable flames bursting from her very soul.

"Easy now." The fiend soothed calmly sensing the gushing flow of puissant magic. Control had to be learned just as spells and incantations, but she did not possess the knowledge yet to steady the streams of power. Magic trickled from his finger tips to control the flow of her new power. "Focus, feel, execute."

Belle stared in silent awe as thin tendrils of scarlet erupted from her finger tips. Warm magic, heavy with the fragrances of a warm spring day, brushed against her father's drenched forehead. His thick brow beetled ponderous as the strain upon his haggard features soothed.

Slowly his large red rimmed eyes fluttered open dazedly. As though still in the lands of dream he smiled indolently. "Belle, I knew you would come. I knew you would find a way to end that mad man Gaston's treachery."

"Papa." Belle breathed a sigh of abject relief. Hugging him tightly she pushed away the damp tendrils of thin hair that gummed his face. "It's all over now."

He coughed heavily. "Not yet, my dear. We…we need to make certain this never can happen again. You must find away to seal the creature away so he will never be controlled again."

"I can't do that, Papa." She clutched his drooping hand tightly as though willing him to understand. "I will not do such a horrendous thing to the man I love."

Love it was and love of Rumpelstiltskin she would not deny, even to her father. Given a chance she would let the entire world would know she loved him. Never would she lie of he who warmed her heart and her soul sing.

"Love?" Maurice muttered blusteringly before another wracking cough stole his words. Breath rattled fitfully through his lungs as he fought for air. His eyes glared to the Dark One hatefully as he swallowed down another cough and controlled himself. "What has he done to you, Belle? What spell or curse or threat has he laid upon you to hurt me so and torment you?"

The beauty smiled sadly. "Nothing Papa. We share a love that no magic could ever server. Our love is the most powerful magic of all. If I didn't love him no enchantment would tell me otherwise. I want to share my life with him. I am forgoing my right to rule and I am leaving with him to his home."

There was no need to dance warily upon the matter, Belle reckoned bravely. They could not dawdle to perhaps lessen the sting of her word to her father. Either he would take things poorly or understand.

What had been frailty upon his plump visage disintegrated like mist against a summer sun into alarm and roiling anger. Wrath adorned his waxy blubbery face as he fought to surface from the bed and confront the grimacing fiend.

"You beastly churl! You monster! How dare you think to take my daughter away to defile her and sever our ancient traditions. Be gone and take your foul magic's with you!" He shook his fist to the Dark One hatefully. "Better I had stayed in nightmare than for you to have healed me and bring me to this!"

"He didn't heal you Papa." Belle's smile fell to a dour frown. "I healed you." To prove her words, she brought forth a small crimson spark of magic to a finger tip. A single flame was the best she could do on her own without her Rum's aid, but the proof was more than enough to confirm her words.

Shock flashed in Maurice's eyes. His orbs were wide as twin moons as he stared at the magic in her hand before she banished the spark. "You have this dastardly power now?" Grasping her hand desperately his eyes softened with pleading. "Give it back, Belle. Don't have any part of this. Banish this monster and be the rightful ruler of you people."

"I won't, Papa." Belle shook her head. "And to be truthful I never wanted to rule. I am going to marry him and learn his trade of magic."

"You…you…" The aged monarch floundered for words. His large lips moved and plump jowls wobbled and yet not a sound rolled from his tongue. After a moment of starting and stopping he sighed lugubriously. "You're really going to do this; become the wife of a monster and learn his foul trade?"

The beauty only nodded in reply.

Removing his hand from hers as though she were a leper, her father's voice grew cold and distant. Anger, like freshly forged daggers flashed from his eyes. "If you do this you will be banished from our land; shunned by your people."

"I know." She whispered brokenly, her heart tearing.

"You break ancient tradition." He wheezed heavily, his body shuddered with sharp, hard fought breath. Icy eyes stared at her hatefully. "You are no daughter of mine. You're just as foul and disgusting as the beast. To think, my only daughter loves a monster." The bitter king scoffed cruelly and averted his eyes in displeasure. "You're going to marry the thing and probably bear him some mongrel, half breed children and still be under the illusion your happy!"

"Father or not you would do well to curb your tongue against my wife-to-be." Rumpelstiltskin interjected with a warning growl of protectiveness and fury mingled into a deadly storm. Hatred and murder flashed viciously in his ebony depths as he loomed over the paled king. "By marrying me she not only finds a creature who will treat her with all the love and care she deserves, but spares your people a fate that would have befallen them."

How dare the inept King who could not even see past his vaunted traditions call the daughter that had already done and sacrificed such wretched things? How could the fool put wonderful, beautiful Belle on his level of creature and beast? She was a radiant star, and yet her father tried to mar her.

"Get out." The king mumbled after gathering what little remained of his composure. His plump, quivering finger pointed out the window and into the tree top horizon. "Both of you leave our kingdom and never return. We don't need two monsters here let alone a traitor princess."

"I'm sorry we couldn't see eye to eye, Papa." Belle remarked sadly as she stood with all the gracefulness befit one of her former station. In a heartbeat she had lost her entire life, her home, her people, and even her only blood family. "My only hope is in time you'll understand."

Steady, but grieved, the beauty exited to the room with her love. It wasn't easy she knew, but it had to be done.

Mingled with the grief that stewed inside her soul something like a blot of happiness grew within the depths of her heart. Being severed from her home and life and people was a hard blow and yet something wonderful began to bloom amidst the char and ash and rubble of a life burned and torn away. Freedom. True, unadulterated freedom burst into her soul.

She was an exile and an outcast to her people but she was free of duty that would chain her with a man she did not love in a station she never wanted.

Despite her sadness a smile bloomed upon her lips.

"I'm sorry, my Belle." The Dark One wrapped his wiry arms about her.

Laying her head upon his chest she let forth a sigh. "It had to be done…it had to."

Warmth radiated to the beauty as he held her in his arms to comfort her as best he could from her loss. "What happens now?"

"Now." A faint smile traced her pink mouth as she looked up to her love. "Now, Rumpelstiltskin we wed."

~8~8~

_A/N: Only one more chapter to go!_


	25. A Loving End

They were married in the cool of the evening upon the beauty's most sacred of sanctuaries.

Summer's eve fell with an unusual grandeur upon the realm of King Maurice. Shafts of fading light slipped through the thick canopy above to beam upon the serene coppice in the midst of the king's woods. The silver rivulet that snaked through the dark forest babbled pleasantly amidst the chirps of birds singing their last hymns of the day and the croak of frogs interwoven with the symphonies of crickets just beginning their bucolic serenades to the nightly hours.

Stunted stalks of grass danced upon the breath of a mild zephyr. Autumn barely hinted along the warm kiss of wind foretelling the steady decline of summer nigh in the coming months.

Half a year had passed since mistress and slave had entered the kingdom of King Maurice on the soggy, late spring morn. Half a year had changed so much betwixt them from a scheming Dark One seeking his owners blood by means of trickery, to a man who wished with all his being to call his former mistress his wife, and a princess who merely wished to keep her people safe and him content to a free woman who would cherish nothing better than to call the master of magic's husband.

Through time and eternal kindness and understanding they grew to love until even fear and denial could not longer veil their emotions in the back of their spirits. Love surpassed all things in their hearts and wrought the goodness and dedication and bravery instilled in their souls.

The wedding was a secluded, private affair bereft of luxury or grandiose ornament befitting a princess. Rumpelstiltskin apologized immensely for the sorry state of their matrimony as they trekked slowly through the cool forest in the small time alone before the ceremony.

Embarrassment and unworthiness surged through him with a fierce sense disappointment. She was a princess after all and perhaps wished for some awe struck spectacle that would be talked about for months to come. Many women dreamed of their marvelous weddings since childhood, and here he was, the Dark One, offering a small affair in the woodland. They were even dressed in their normal attire; he in mulled leather and she in her favorite blue dress, in favor of expensive wedding garments.

Instead of disappointment to dash her merriment, Belle thought no place better of tranquil or memorable to say their vows. A thick veil of verdant trees served as their chapel and the sounds of forest as the fairest minstrels in all the land.

There were to be married as they were; raw and open as they would always be.

Searching the expanse of her mind, Belle truly could not find another spot as lovely and perfect to wed the man she loved. She needed not an expensive, lavish affair. Simply being with him and placing her hand in his for all eternity was the grandest of weddings.

Disappointment that her father would not give her away or offer his approval was the only dark cloud that lurked in her otherwise jubilant heart. And even that seemed to pale as she looked at her love stare down with the same affection that bound her to him.

A graying, slightly hunched cleric the Dark One 'borrowed' from the temple stood before the pair under a green bower of oak leaves. White robes embroidered with intricate patterns of gold garbed his bent figure humbly. His bald, liver spotted head showed with a glassy sheen that would have been comical had the moment not been so important and reverent. Fear flashed in his watery orbs with the look of a man trapped by a ferocious bear with a cliff to his back.

The Dark One had threatened him in no uncertain terms of his task. He would perform the wedding ceremony of the princess and if he refused his intestines would be strung up along the rafters of the temple like morbid garland for the acolytes and devotees to come across the next day.

Terrified for his life, the cleric submitted to the request and was abducted to the tranquil little glade where the beauty awaited with baited anxiousness. She wasn't sure who her love would get, but was delighted to see the aged priest she'd known so long as a young girl.

A glow of happiness radiated from her lovely features to view her love returned with his quarry like a loyal hound and she even hugged the humble cleric and assured him not to be afraid. 'Her Rum' as she called the oddly skinned aberration with affection, would not dare harm a hair on one of her people.

The humble cleric merely nodded in feigned acquiescence for he believed not a word until he was safely back in his temple amidst the scents of smoky incense and the dusty smell of old benches.

Sarah, kind governess and loyal guardian to the former princess now branded an exiled traitor, stood as the only witness. Rumors amongst the people had told, when the cruel Gaston was in power the women had been ill. Now, to the sagely cleric, she looked as though a new life had been granted her. Healthy redness dabbed her dimpled cheeks and her steps had a bounce that had sorely flagged in the years past.

As the last of the odd little band, the servant sat on a moss carpeted log and watched the girl she had raised into a bright woman give her hand in marriage. Tears brooked down her plump cheeks as she stared at the girl she'd raise truly discover her happy ending. Not many were bestowed with their true love and fair chance at a happy life, but if anyone deserved the moment, Belle certainly did.

The wedding was a quaint, simple affair with a traditional ceremony and a few words of their own, as was customary to many couples who wed for love more than gain and expediency. Their rings were plain as any a peasant might have for their wedding day, all save they had been forged with magic.

Dark power shimmered upon the golden gloss of the cold bands and each radiated a love and care they had taken when conjuring their signets of matrimony. A single gold thread was the basis for their bands as though an eternal reminder of their lives entwined with magic amidst their ardor.

With the words spoken and the bands slipped unto one another fingers, the cleric sighed and stared at them warily. A squeak of fear seemed to leap from his throat shrilly as he spoke in a trembling rasp. "I…suppose you both know what happens next. A… kiss to seal the marriage."

Taking a step back, he outstretched his hands in his customary pose when wedding a man and wife.

Bottomless ebony orbs flickering to his love, Rumpelstiltskin smiled softly. "Shall we take the risk, my Belle?"

He would kiss her, if only for a moment to finalize the ceremony if she wished it. How could he be so cold as to abstain a peck on the lips on their wedding day no less, even though it would be no more than a chaste meeting which lasted less that a hearts beat?

True, she had her magic now, but True Love had not changed their situation. Nay, they were only doubled in their affection and love and the longing want to meet their lips but could not.

"Not yet." Belle smiled sadly in reply. "We can't risk that quite yet. I have a feeling this kiss would be more potent than the last"

To ask a kiss of him would have been wrong. He could not risk having their power stripped away, not when they had so many enemies on so many sides.

Stark relief mingled with regret visibly marked the Dark One's gray-gold face. Talons gently brushed the forever rebellious tendril of umber hair from her features lovingly. "How perceptive you are, my Belle. How lovely and kind. My biggest regret will be not being able to kiss you on our wedding day."

"One day." She laughed merrily, her musical tone banishing the faint hint of melancholy tingeing their light filled souls.

"Yes." A tender smile mounted his thin gray lips as he pulled her close as though to press his lips against hers. "One day."

In the land without magic he would be able to lavish her with kisses whenever he pleased for as long as he desired. No curse would impede them then and no bitterness to coat their joy in the strange land without the mystic arts. He could adorn her with every affection love demanded and not have to worry if his curse would shatter and leave them both defenseless in the face of their foes. In the years that would drag by he would have wealth and power and Belle, his Belle and not have to fear another.

Cupping her face in his scaled claws he stared down upon his wife. "But until that day comes we shall have to make different arrangements."

Joy burst like brilliant gouts of merry flames in his heart as he kissed her forehead. Never would such a gesture compare to a true kiss they were denied from sharing, but it was as close as they could come.

Pleased beyond all other measure, the beauty wrapped her arms about her husband's sinewy frame. Warmth raced happily through her veins as she held him close and dictated the eve to memory to call upon in times of ill and in romance as their years grew.

Sitting upon her moss strewn perch, the plump Sarah dabbed her tear filled eyes with a pink handkerchief. Loss shrouded her heart like dark clouds scudding across the sun. In but moments the girl she had raised would be gone and perhaps never to be seen again by her eyes.

Oh but how life had to change. She had reared and known the beauty for long, long years and treasured her like any mother would. Her life was moving on with the man she loved and no selfish woman's heart had a right to stop that, the maid knew dourly.

"Darkness will be nigh soon." Sarah sighed to dam the tears and slipped off her plush green seat to pad over to the pair. Wiping the tears away from her cheeks with the curve of her hand, a sad smile crept upon her cheery face. Arms wrapped around her former charge in a hug. "Both of you had best be going." Stoic will kept her from sobbing as she patted Belle's cheek. "You make sure to tame that man of yours, child. The next time I see him I want him to have some manners."

"Of course, Sarah." Laughed Belle hoarsely to keep her own tears from being shed as she kissed her beloved guardian upon the cheek.

She was dedicated to her people, and would always love her father, but Sarah would be the only one she would miss. To no longer be with her old friend was a bitter sweet moment, she endured with the help of her love.

Thick, purple mist bloomed betwixt the quartet like lilac vines springing from the warm ground. Tendrils of power spiraled about their feet and coiled upwards to enshroud them in arcane power.

Head placed delicately on her husband's chest, his thin arm wrapped about her waist, Belle watched her friend disappear in the haze of lavender and a wave of goodbye. Laughter trickled from her lips as she spied the homely, old cleric try to pat the magic away as though he were on fire. Sarah looked back to scold him roundly for being so afraid and in a moment they were no more.

They would meet again in the future she had assured her guardian, but being away still left a hollow pang in the epicenter of her heart.

As loyal maid and frightened cleric vanished in the spurts of damson hued power, the Dark One looked down at his wife. Love flashed in this sable orbs as the magic shelled about them. "Do you really think you can tame me?" He jested as the magic flowed through his flesh to deign him intangible.

"I will most certainly try." Spectral laughter rang gaily about the forest glade before they too disappeared to a new home and new life. "But who can tell." Her misty smile beamed upon him like a ray of sun spearing through fog. "I might become as uncivilized as the man I wed."

~8~8~

Chill, bitter wind nipped at Belle's exposed flesh as the pair arrived at their destination in a thunderous cloud of amethyst. Snow glistened wondrously like diamonds upon the cold world and blanketed the land about them in a deep sea of alabaster frost.

Misty mountains, capped with snowy tips upon their dizzying apex, rambled in the distance as a line of jagged peaks and perilous crags. The mountains surrounded them upon all sides like bluish, keen blades of knights with their points thrust upwards against the azure firmaments to protect the frozen dale in the center.

Any who dared seek to pass the treacherous fangs save through a singular, snaking path known to but a few, would be hard pressed to scale such dizzying heights and brave the dangers and legendary beasts of the mountains. Yet as awe inspiring and grand as the lovely pearly blue mountains and the banks of unblemished snow being swirled by the whirling wind amazed her, his home, their home took her breath away.

Gray spires, frosted with crisp snow, pierced the cloudless lapis sky. Pennants of emerald green and intricately embroidered with burnished gold with a roaring dragon rampant fluttered in the cool gnashing wind. The Dark Castle was certainly grandiose if not with an aura of foreboding.

Ashen stone walls stood out against the blinding white that lined every precipice like smooth icing on a cake. An ominous air seemed to radiate from the dark windows and the doors to the keep which stood as a closed maw, but to Belle the place already felt like home, not of some strange abode to be feared. The stronghold seemed as though she had merely been away for long years, not a new home sequestered away from the rest of the world.

Perhaps, she considered thoughtfully as they forged through the drifts of snow, given her love had lived their so long or that it would be shared by them alone coaxed a fondness for the citadel in her soul.

"You must forgive me, Belle." The Dark One fumbled endearingly over his words. A scaled hand rubbed the back of his neck bashfully as he focused on the snow. "I had forgotten. We are half way across the word. It is winter here, where it was waning summer in your home."

Snow crunched beneath their light shoes and seeped into the hems and edges of their clothes. Had they been stranded, the matter of warmth and proper clothing would have been immediate in the beauties mind, but with their home looming before them she could already feel the crackling fires in the stone hearths and his body pressed against hers to rectify any traces of chill the snow wrought.

Milky, opaque vapors stole from her mouth as she laughed softly. "It's wonderful, Rum. I've never seen so much snow. Back in my land even the winters are not terrible."

"Yes well, until you learn spells for warmth you'll freeze out here." He proffered his hand to the entrance of the citadel nestled in the middle of nowhere. Bowing deeply, he smiled with a comforting warmth that banished the gnashing cold from Belle's flesh better than any fur cloak could. "Shall we, my wife?"

With a giggle, Belle slipped her arm into her husbands. The pair walked regally, sharing warmth as they entered the Dark Castle.

The thick, iron banded doors groaned in protests upon their hinges as the fiend shoved them open with a Herculean strength to display the vestibule of his manor. Snow scuffed in behind them as the wind swept through the uninhabited domicile.

A thick mustiness wafted heavily upon the cold air telling of months, nay, years without a thorough cleaning. Dirt and filth marred the stone floors and the trinkets strewn about his ancient home. Darkness blotted the rooms with an impenetrable blackness which seemed almost a physical entity to the somber palace that lurked the hall as wolves preyed in the forest.

Rumpelstiltskin coughed into his fist nervously. "I know it needs a good cleaning, and lonely for such a big place but I hope you would learn to be happy here."

How he wished she could at least tolerate his abode though the castle was dreadfully lonely and bereft of life. Where servants should have trod remained intrepid rats, and where nobles would have rested their heads and entertained themselves was barren or filled with gold. Of course he would try his hardest to make her happy, but the castle did belong to a monster.

"I already love it." She pecked a kiss on his cheek, her words thrilling with elation in her knew dwelling. "It needs a bit of a woman's touch and perhaps to let down a few curtains and then it will truly be perfect."

"A woman's touch?" Chewing the words thoughtfully, he rumbled a small laugh in his throat. "I've been a bachelor for centuries, but I think I could adjust to that. Perhaps even come to enjoy your splashes of femininity in the keep of a beast."

On a whim, he wrapped his arm about her waist and spun her about the colonnaded hall. "I can see it now; a bouquet of roses next to a pile of skulls, carpets in the dungeons, and cooking dinner alongside a dreadfully toxic potion all the while wondering which is the powdered Giantswort and which is the salt."

"Giving it some thought already I see." Parried Belle with a laugh as he gently landed her to her feet again.

His hand wrapping bout hers he nudged his head down a chillingly black corridor. Flicking his free hand, torches that laid dormant in the sconces flared to life. Light blazed grandly down the long hall revealing sets of dingy steel armors lining the walls and tapestries he'd collected in his years.

Motioned a wiry talon down the corridor a faint smile drew upon his lips. "Come, we've much more to see. I must show you where my apothecary sits and the rest of the Dark Castle."

The apothecary was where she would learn the art of mixing potions and elixirs and practice most of her magic. There she would grow to be one of the most deadly sorceress' in their world.

Belle shook her head slightly and tugged at his hand. Mischief donned her lovely face with a look that made the Dark One's heart leap. Fingers plucking at his leather vest she flicked her eyes innocently up to her half smiling husband. "I think the tour can wait. I truly want to see one room - our bed room."

~8~ **Two years later **~8~8~

Thick mist wafted knee high upon treacherously moist forest land. Nocturnal beast skittered under the dense underbrush in search of prey and the denizens of the darkest hours sat perched in their trees or in the blackest of shadows awaiting to strike. Golden eyes of sagely owls peered like moons through the canopy above, their eerie hoots echoing through chilling darkness.

Sounds of the night seemed to leap out as physical manifestations. Each passing moment wrought forth a new terror. The gnarled branches and oddly shaped boles upon trees appeared akin to gleefully cavorting demons in the dead hours where all who were good and just should have been snug in their berths.

"I don't like this, Robin." A mountain of a man remarked to his smaller companion by his side anxiously. His dark, disapproving frown was adumbrated behind a thick reddish beard that hung like willow moss to his chest.

The smaller, but agile fellow uttered a mirthless, nervous laugh to his companion. A mottled green and brown cowl hung lowly over his head keeping his features hidden. Fingers warily tapped the hilt of the dirk tucked into his leather belt. Slapping the hulking man on the back jovially, he attempted to sound carefree. "Worry not, Little John, I heard this beast of yore is inclined to clandestine meetings such as this. You don't deem to think it would meet us in a filled town square where all could hear of our deal or gape, do you?"

"Indeed not." Another slightly amused female voice agreed through the dark, verdant forest.

Alarmed both men unsheathed their blades at but a moments notice. The short sword in the large man's bear-like grip looked akin to a dagger, but his large, brown eyes brimmed with a fierce protectiveness and rage.

With more finesse, the slimmer man brandished his blade expertly in his grip. Twirling the steel he could not help but display his comfortable prowess. Gray eyes peered out from under the cowl intently into the darkness as he kept light on his toes.

The spry female voice giggled. "Behind you, gentleman. Or rather above."

Both whirled about, their cloaks rustling in the mist. Owls chocked back their mournful hoots and even the crickets had ceased their chirped symphonies with the sensation of magic crackling through the air.

Belle sat easily upon a half fallen elm tree caught upon one of its kin. The half felled tree made a perfect perch for an unwanted guest to pry down upon the meeting place of the two men pacing below.

Crossed legs dangled above them vapidly, her cunning smile seemed to blaze down upon them as though in mocking. Bright red leather attired her lovely slender form as though another skin. Thick chestnut hair cascaded down her shoulders freely and glinted in the slivers of moon that peeped from the bower of leaves.

"Who are you?" Roared the hulking fellow furiously, his yellow teeth bared like fangs. The large veins upon his hand popped from his skin as he brandished his blade upwards towards the easily smiling woman.

The hooded figure placed a hand on his companion's boulder-like shoulder. "Calm yourself friend. She's an unarmed maiden, if not an expert at scaling trees." Turning his head toward the female he dipped a curt bow. "Forgive my companions ferocity, but you must admit this is an ominous grove we find ourselves. Who might you be, my lady?"

"A person who can make what you wish come true." The beauty admitted freely, a note of mystery in her pleasing tone.

Little John grimaced dubious. Eyes narrowed he growled at the lackadaisical woman. "Surely you cannot be the infamous Dark One. Legend told he was a monstrous beast not some beautiful maiden who sits in trees and prowls where she had no business."

"Don't believe everything you hear." She chided pleasantly.

Pride stung, the hulking bear of a man growled angrily. "We come to seek a beast, not a beauty. I don't believe it!'

"John I believe she is telling the truth." The cloaked figure interjected hastily to the temperamental ally. "As she claimed she is only _a _person to aid us not the _only _person to help in our quest for justice."

Impression flashed in her pale blue eyes like sparks of fire. "A clever one you are, sir Robin of Locksley." Easing down from her perilous heights she landed lightly on her feet like a veteran cat. "You are correct. I am but one of two Dark One's. My husband is currently…indisposed."

The bear of a man's disapproving grimace twisted into disgust. "Husband? What heavy price did you pay for a deal, my lady?"

"Indisposed? How?" The hooded figure echoed curiously while trying to ignore his companion. One displeasing word could have them leaving with empty hands or worse.

Belle gestured unconcernedly towards the pair with a flick of her hand. Hiding her nervousness she kept her pretense of ease. "It is of no consequence. All that matters is what you want and what can you give me."

"Fair enough." Robin nodded, relieved she was not offended by John brusque manner. Unveiling himself, he smiled roguishly at the female. His dark beard was neatly trimmed and his hair was thick and shaggy. Smiles readily seemed to dot his face, and his light gray eyes glistened with barely suppressed mischief.

Coughing once, he continued. "Years ago I bargained for a potion that made me the most skilled archer in all the realms. No one could best my skill and I used my gift to help alleviate the tyranny of my people."

Belle huffed a slight laugh though seemed not impressed. "A noble enough cause."

Robin nodded dourly. "It was, and can be again. Some weeks ago I found my power to be waning. For some reason the potion has begun to wear off. I am missing shots and my bowman ship is lacking. I need something to help my skill."

"Another potion or a permanent solution." Belle concluded, her tone bored as though she dealt with such situations every day. "And what will you give me in return?" She queried as she slowly encircled the pair.

Little John stammered fitfully. "The knowledge you help and ailing realm, lady."

"Not good enough." Her insouciant tones were happy but clipped to cut the hulking man off before he worked himself into a fine, righteous rage.

"We have gold." The smaller fellow piped up. Coins bulged from a dark leather bag tied to his belt.

Belle scoffed lowly. "Gold is nothing to me, Robin of Locksley. My husband makes gold by the spool. No, I want something dear to you. Something you would recognize on the spot." Cunning flashed in her eyes as her gaze trailed his lean, muscular body. "You know of what I speak."

For a moment the handsome man was silent as the world about them. Deep pondering glinted in his eyes before he nodded succinctly. "Done."

"Robin." The large man whispered warily, his tone heavy with confusion. "What does she want?"

Wordlessly the archer shifted his thick cloak. A polished rowan bow lay strung beneath the shroud. The weapon was tipped with points of gold and the string was waxed with the most expensive of tallow.

"I can get a bow anywhere." He sullenly held out the weapon. "But if this will give me my power back then so be it."

Little John butted in in bristling outrage. Astonishment lined his face scarred, battle worn face. "How can you do this, Robin? Miriam gave you that bow! You nearly died trying to procure it back from the prince not two days ago!"

"Which is why it's valuable." Belle chirped happily. Grabbing the weapon she flitted her fingers through the air as though she were some child.

Crimson mist like long, winding snakes vapidly flowed from her fingertips and seeped into the archer. His eyes rolled into the back of his head as the magic worked upon his mind and fingers. Power flowed through his form to allow him the prowess of bow and arrow once more.

Laughter bubbled from her lips as she hefted the bow. "The deal is struck." Turning she paused for a moment. Not bothering to look back she added causally. "A word of advice. This power will not avail you much in the long run. If you must borrow power then that is not power at all." With that she disappeared in the folds of the ominous forest.

Once far away, Belle allowed her masks of cold carelessness to drop. Held breath burst from her lips as she leaned against a tree. It was always a fight to hold back her nature and not simply help a person free of charge or not show concern. Oh but appearance had to be kept and reputations to uphold.

She had done deals before in her loves stead, but none as important as this. Robin Hood's famed bow, a key point in his plots. Looking down upon the bow, Belle rubbed her hands along the polished wood thoughtfully. What would he do with such a strange weapon?

Abruptly hands wrapped about her waist severing her thought in a blink of an eyes. A gasp nearly erupted from her lips as scaled hand laid over her mouth.

"You were perfect." Rumpelstiltskin commended happily. Pleasure glowed in his sable depths as smiled down upon her "One would have thought you'd been doing this for veritable ages."

Letting his hand fall away, the beauty could not help but feel a grin steal upon her lips. "I though you had a meeting with Regina?"

"I did." He let her wriggle free from his arms through she did not move far. "The deed is done. Soon this world will be not even a memory."

Displeasure fringed Belle's lips at his hard words. Of course she swore to him two long years ago not to interfere with his plans, but to say she approved would have been a lie. Back when she had only been a princess trying to fight for her people's lives and be with her love, she had nary given a thought to his machinations she swore not to attempt to quell. Never had she thought his plot would be to transport all of them to a land without magic!

For the last years he had been perfecting his plot to find his son and be rid of his curse at the expense of their world. Still, even with his scheme known and the many arguments they had shared over his plans, she loved him though he was led my misguided redemption.

Banishing the unpleasant thought away she held out the bow. "What will this help?"

"He will play a key role when the curse is broken." He explained. Fluttering his scaled hand through the air, the bow vanished in a veil of purple mist. "Prince John and Regina have been conspiring for long years. By the time he finds out who kidnapped his fair maid the curse will have struck. And when the curse breaks…."

"He'll seek to find Regina for revenge." Belle sighed. She could not honesty say she understood his plots, but they all made sense in the long run.

Seeing her melancholy and disapproval he kissed her upon her cheek. "It will be alright, I promise."

Abruptly smile lifted upon his lips. Cocking his head to the side he peered into his wife's eyes lovingly. "It's our anniversary." He announced simply.

"I was wondering when you'd bring it up." Belle managed a smile as she forced the thoughts of abduction out of her mind. She could not change what was to come to pass. All was ready and they had nothing to do save wait. To interfere now would be akin to trying to stop a rampaging dragon with a dinner fork.

"There is somewhere special I wish to take you before all of this ends." The Dark One claimed. Mischief donned his face as he beckoned magic to his call. "It's a surprise. Close your eyes, my Belle."

Obedient, Belle shut her eyes. A brow perched in curiosity, but she remained still with her magic's drawn as to not spoil his surprise. If she had truly been curious a pulse of her own magic mingled with his would have told her all.

Warmth radiated upon her face as the magic delivered them to his destination. Wood crackled in some hearth and the world smelled of fresh rain and the remnants of a harsh summer storm.

"Open." He murmured lowly in her ear.

A gasp fell from Belle's mouth as she stared upon a quaint stone room. It had been exactly as she had left it when they left for the palace. Her home away from home of the stone cottage.

"If this be our last night in our world, I wish to end where we began." Rumpelstiltskin explained softly. His hands guided her gently to the soft bed nestled under a square window.

Belle could not contain a gentle moan as he nipped her neck with small bites and kisses. A dreamy smile came unbidden to her face as he laid her down upon the bed. "I remember the day well. You were angry and I was frightened to see you kneeling upon the floor in the kitchen."

"You were so polite and nervous towards me." He picked up the tale in-between hot kisses. "I though you would be a cruel mistress and yet you were far from vile."

She laughed softly, her timbre drifting like a song about the room. "You seemed so surprised I was not commanding you about. In that moment you were taken off guard I saw more than a legend, but a man behind the tales. That was when I knew I loved you, Rum."

In the distant an unholy peal of thunder rumbled perniciously. Sordid purple clouds gathered in the distant like the billowing cloak of death. Silver lighting cracked in their folds as the power barreled down upon the unsuspecting world. Stars extinguished in the sky and even the palled disk of the moon dimmed and then blotted out past the curdling vapors of darkness.

Magic filled the air like fumes from a rampaging fire and yet neither gave heed.

A groan fell past his lips as she kiss his jaw. His voice was hoarse as her lips found his throat. "When you let me sleep in the other room. The first thing I did was open my shirt. Your name was engraved over my heart and I knew…I knew I loved you then. I knew when I first uttered your name I loved you."

Passion rose and surged within them in the last moments of their lives as Dark One's. Each recalled the wondrous, special memories they had forged in laughter and smiles and anger and the bond that entwined their lives and fate. A love joined them and a dagger had been the needle that bound them as one flesh.

Looking deep into her cerulean eyes, the Dark One smiled tenderly to his love. Wind howled ferociously about them and the trees creaked with strain from the heavy press of magic, but neither noticed.

For a precious instance neither spoke. In moments no more would the cottage be the place they had known. Lives would be altered perhaps past recognition and for 28 long years they would live stuck in a loop if they even survived at all.

Stroking her porcelain cheek tenderly, the Dark One memorized her face for the last time. Forever would the last image of her in their , caught in the resonating throes of pleasure be a portrait in his mind.

Belle stared deep into his onyx depths. Love, pure and sweet glimmered in her azure orbs. There was no better moment than to be with him when their world came crumbling down.

"I love you." Both proclaimed in gentle, simultaneous whispers of ultimate affection before the roiling clouds of purple mist engulfed them.

~8~8~

_A/N: I hope you all enjoyed this tale. I had so much fun writing this and I sincerely hope you all liked reading. There might (and I use that with the utmost reservation) be a sequel, but I'm not certain about anything. Anyway, just thanks so much of all the support for all the reading and reviewing and favorites and alerts. You are all awesome! :3_


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